Learning from each other
In this Issue
Creative Fund Raising EventsFOCUS GROUPS ready to roll out across the province
Accreditation and Best Practices
As volunteers or staff speak to students, it is helpful if they clearly communicate the good that a distress centre does in the community, how volunteers can use their skills and gain new ones, and how volunteering will benefit volunteers and clients. Telling stories of how people have been helped is powerful and motivates people to get involved. Giving statistics about the nature of the problem—like the number of people impacted by suicide in the community or the number of people living with a mental illness in an area—are also helpful in motivating people to volunteer.
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Fundraising events can be time-consuming and often yield a poor financial return on the time invested. But a creative signature event that raises the profile of an agency while raising funds can be worth the effort.
Rukshini Ponniah, Executive Director of Distress Centre Windsor Essex was pleased by the results of their “De-Stress: Martinis, Manicures, and much much More” event held on May 26, 2008 at the Toscana Restaurant in Windsor. The sold out event was attended by about 150 people. Tickets were sold for $40 each.
People who attended the event watched a fashion show while they enjoyed a martini and all-you-can-eat appetizers. Attendees also had the option of getting a manicure and a makeup application. Vendors offering a variety of “girly” products were invited to the event. Each vendor donated a door prize and 10% of any sales they made.
Ponniah, says she got the idea for the great event from staff at the distress centres in London and Durham who hold similar events.
London and District Distress Centre calls their event “Diva Day.” Their fifth annual “spa and entertainment day” was held at the elegant Windermere Manor in London on March 2nd of this year. Their event raised almost $25,000. See photos at http://www.londondistresscentre.com/Introduction.htm.
Making the Most of a Fundraising Event
- publicize your event on radio, tv and newspaper websites—most have free event listings
- also submit your event for a free listing in any newspapers or for Public Service Announcements on tv and radio (this usually needs to be done 6-8 weeks ahead of time)
- send out a media release about your event, remember to include a newsworthy angle related to your centre and your event like a former caller who became a volunteer or a volunteer who used the skills they learned in your training to help a suicidal friend
- put up a booth at your event that lets people know about your centre, volunteer opportunities available, and ways they can donate to the cause
- if you have a mailing list that you send information about future events and/or newsletters, put out a sign-up list so people can sign up to receive your communication via email or snail mail
- get an experienced photographer to volunteer to take digital photos at your event that you can include in newsletters, on your website, and send to media outlets at their request (make sure you to tell people what the photos will be used for, consider a photo release form to get permission for all photos you use)
- send out a media release immediately after your event noting anything newsworthy like the number of people who attended, how much money was raised and anything else significant that occurred, tell media outlets if you have photos available
Recruiting Post-Secondary Students as Volunteers
In 2004, 11.8 million Canadians gave almost 2 billion hours to charities and non-profit organizations. According to Caring Canadians, Involved Canadians which is summary of the 2004 Canada Survey of Giving, Volunteering and Participating, the top three reasons for volunteering were: a desire to make a contribution to the community, wanting to use one’s skills and experience, and wanting to give to a cause that the volunteer was affected by. On average, volunteers gave 168 hours in 2004. The highest proportion of volunteers came from the 15 to 24 year old age group—at 55%.
Connecting with enough of the right volunteers to staff a distress centre line is a challenge but member centres are finding ways to recruit and retain the people they need to carry out their work. Two centres—Distress Centre Niagara and Distress Centre Windsor Essex—have been successful at recruiting post-secondary student volunteers.
Why Post-secondary Students are a Good Fit as Distress Centre Volunteers
There are many reasons that post-secondary students are a good fit for volunteer positions with distress centres. Post-secondary students often have flexible schedules that allow them to work a variety of distress line shifts—including overnights. Many students are in need of experience related to their field of study—something that distress centres can provide. The intensive training provided by distress centres is also attractive to students. “The training that DCN staff have developed is very interactive and volunteers can use the skills they learn in their daily lives when faced with family and friends in emotional crisis,” says Stacy Terry, Program Manager at Distress Centre Niagara (DCN).
Distress Centre Niagara and Distress Centre Windsor Essex
DCN is located in St. Catharines and provides a 24-hour help line service for residents of the Niagara region. Most volunteers at DCN are between 21 and 28 years old—many of them come from Brock University or Niagara College. Volunteers are asked to make a one year commitment of at least 192 hours. At this time, DCN has about 50 active volunteers, including a dedicated group of older volunteers in addition to the many students. Distress Centre Windsor Essex (DCWE) staffs a distress line from12 pm to 12 am daily. Most of their 55 volunteers are 25 or younger and are students—mainly from the University of Windsor and St. Clair College.
Recruiting Students at Colleges and Universities
Terry says that DCN gets most of their volunteers by making opportunities known at Brock University and Niagara College. DCN opportunities are listed on Brock University’s online listing of community agencies and volunteer opportunities at http://www.brocku.ca/communityconnections/volunteer.php.In the past DCN staff and volunteers spoke for 10 to 15 minutes in classrooms to talk about what students can do; they plan to do this again in the near future. DCWE staff members send notices to professors at University of Windsor in relevant fields like Social Work and Nursing and to St. Clair College in departments like Law and Security. Volunteers and staff also go in and speak when invited.Terry says that word of mouth is their most successful recruitment strategy. “We remind our current volunteers that we need more volunteers,” she says. It’s helpful when distress centre volunteers who attend a post-secondary institution make presentations in their classrooms about their volunteer experience and how others can get involved.
Making Volunteer Positions Student-Friendly
Career centres at colleges and universities encourage students to volunteer in the community as a way to get experience in a field they want to work in. College and University career centre web pages can be reviewed as agencies develop or revise volunteer positions and descriptions to ensure opportunities are student-friendly. Visit the University of Toronto Career Centre webpage at http://www.careers.utoronto.ca/myCareer/getExperience/volunteering.aspx?tr or the Wilfrid Laurier University (Waterloo, Ont.) pages at http://www.mylaurier.ca/career/students/info/volunteer.htm for examples of what students are looking for. U of T also provides a helpful tip sheet http://www.utsc.utoronto.ca/~counselling/tipsheets/Career/Volunteering.pdf for volunteers that you can use as you develop your job descriptions.
FOCUS GROUPS ready to roll out across the province
The Volunteer Management Committee is working hard at determining the support needs of our member centres. Many of you filled in the second volunteer management survey and we thank you for your input.
Our next initiative is the volunteer focus groups. The test site for the focus group trial was the Durham Distress Centre and it proved to be a great success.
Eight to ten volunteers from the centre spent one and a half hours in a focus group discussing what makes a good distress line volunteer, what motivates them to volunteer and what might improve their experience.
The facilitators were members of the committee and from the Niagara and Oakville Distress Centres. The committee has designed the topics for discussions and they are focussed and encourage good discussion. The discussions are not targeted to the specific centre, rather they focus on the distress line volunteers and their needs.
The information from these focus groups will help us to determine the common components across our sector and help us with our province wide recruitment drive scheduled for later in the year.
The committee is set to roll the focus groups out throughout the province. The DCO offices will be contacting you shortly to set up a convenient time to have the focus group sessions at your centre.
Accreditation and Best Practices
Committee Update
The Accreditation Committee is set to review six to eight recognized accreditation models and determine which are appropriate for our sector. The pre-established criteria to make this determination include a review of applicability to telephone help lines, cost, credentials of evaluators, applicability to volunteer vs paid staff models of service delivery, self-evaluation and accreditation readiness reviews as well as other criteria.
The intent is to present to the membership a recommendation at the November Education Forum and Networking Day.
Thank you to everyone for joining the collaborative proposal for additional funding for this review and we will continue to keep you updated on the progress.
Next Issue
More information
on the
Partnership Toolkit
Ottawa, ON
Nov 7 & 8, 2008
Staff, Volunteers, Board Members and Partners welcome
Theme and Session Information
Crisis Workers Society of Ontario
Upcoming
Events
MARK YOUR CALENDARS
DCO STRATEGIC PLANNING
September 19th,2008
Toronto, ON
DCO AGM
September 19th,2008
Toronto, ON
PARTNERSHIP TOOLKIT -
Educational Forum
Networking Event
Nov 7 & 8, 2008
Travelodge Ottawa Hotel & Conference Centre, ON
COMMUNITY TORCHLIGHT (Distress Centre Wellington and Dufferin) is planning for 'The Walk', event for suicide awareness.
http://www.thewalk.ca/