Engage Library

Alec Dickson is a name not enough newcomers to the field of volunteerism know, yet he was an active and outspoken advocate for the importance of volunteering from the 1950s up to his death in 1994. He founded the British organization, Voluntary Service Overseas, which directly…

Volunteer voices, millions of them, all speaking up and speaking out with passion about what they're doing and what they believe in. Lots of people responding to what they're hearing and giving time to volunteering for whatever they're passionate about. Now that would be…

I remember trying to recruit church volunteers for regular, one-to-one visits with jail inmates. I wasn't having much luck, until I realized that my broader, "real" or "true" goal was not one-to-one visits. It was, instead, providing healthy outside contact and influence for…

If there were a Ten Commandments of Volunteer Management, one of them would surely be the statement "volunteers should supplement, not supplant, paid staff." Drilled firmly into the head of every new volunteer manager is the fact that staff support is dependent upon relieving…

Australia has been a hotbed of volunteering activity for the past few years and this report is an indication of the increasing seriousness with which the Australian government is attempting to involve itself in promoting volunteering. The report was produced as part of the 2001…

Abstract An innovative approach to raising funds burst onto the nonprofit scene a few years back.  Entitled "new philanthropy," it has enthusiastically been adopted by fundraisers wishing to raise the level of their success.  This article proposes that those…

We often speak of volunteers as being on the "cutting edge," or challenging the status quo - both descriptions that represent change. Likewise, the presence of volunteers within an organization may also represent change, a new ways of doing things, or a new way of…

No ancient holy book mentions "volunteering" by that name, but every religion in the world encourages charity, service to others, and personal risk for one's beliefs. This unique article compares the major religions of the world in terms of charity.

Volunteers with strong loyalty to their cause tend to hold their traditions sacred. Imagine what would happen if two long-standing volunteer groups, serving different children's hospitals in the same city, united after decades of fiercely independent -- even competitive --…

Susan: The question of finding "men" to be volunteers and also to be volunteer program managers surfaces quite regularly, frequently accompanied by deep sighs from female colleagues. When a live male candidate actually appears, the sighs change to heavy panting.As you can tell…

Prime Time: How Baby Boomers Will Revolutionize Retirement and Transform America Marc Freedman Public Affairs, New York, 1999 ISBN 1-891620-17-1 Marc Freedman's premise in Prime Time: How Baby Boomers Will Revolutionize Retirement and Transform America is that the baby boom…

The Saguaro Seminar is a program of Harvard University that builds on the work of Robert Putnam (author of Bowling Alone: Collapse and Revival of the American Community). One of its initial activities was to conduct this national survey of almost 30,000 people, released in…

This training is no longer available. 

One of the top ongoing issues of most of the all-volunteer groups in the CompassPoint Nonprofit Services’ study featured in the Winter issue of e-Volunteerism was “reaching new members and keeping them involved.” In the world of volunteer management, that translates to “…

Modern technology makes it easy for anyone with a computer and an Internet connection to access training on virtually any subject. With the click of a mouse, you can learn how to arrange flowers or earn a degree without leaving the comfort of your home. You can log in to join a…

It is almost preordained that keynote speakers and casual essayists, when asked to address the topic of volunteering in the United States, will eventually quote Alexis de Tocqueville, the famous Frenchman who keenly observed American life and then wrote Democracy in America,…

The future of volunteer management as a profession is a hot topic on both sides of the Atlantic, if not in other parts of the world. As evidence, consider the fact that the inaugural issue (Fall 2000) of e-Volunteerism featured several articles dealing with this subject. If our…

Listen to the conference steering committee develop its strategy: "We simply have to offer workshops that will appeal to people who've been in the field a long time and are past the basics. Let's develop an 'advanced' track." This makes sense, but what exactly does everyone mean…

Research years ago showed a very high turnover rate among Coordinators of Volunteers -- the figure I remember is one out of three leaving the field every two or three years (though often staying in the same organization). It was a substantial percentage, anyhow, and I expect it…

As the Internet continues its pervasive growth through global society, attempts to utilize it in volunteer involvement also continue. This article will review efforts to use the Internet to address one of the basic questions in volunteering-- how can volunteers and volunteer…