David's Blog

There are tons of places to volunteer in Orlando. There are Saturday morning feeding the homeless. There are tons of homeless shelters. There are domestic violence shelters. There is habitat for humanity. Sometimes churchs will do community service events too so you can join in with fellow Christians. There's pregnancy centers where you talk to women you have found out they are preg, then help them through it, and then help with post-natal care (Joy might really like this). There's also the boy's and girls club.

You could try out different ones til you find what you have a passion for. I do recommend sticking to one organization for a while so that you can get to know the people there and make a difference. I'm excited that you've thought of this.

I wasn't spending much time looking for place to volunteer in Orlando, because when I am here I am pretty busy with school and work. I was thinking of places to volunteer when I am in Gainesville during the weekends -- where you, Joy, I are during the weekend. I don't really have a whole lot of free time during the week (which is when I am in Orlando,) but back when I did I looked into things to do in Gainesville.

I did try to do Habitat for Humanity roughly two years ago. They had me come to a number of meetings, and they gave me a lot of information, but they basically said that they didn't need any help during that semester. However, if my organization and I were still interested next semester there would be homes going up at that time.

Really, this is a dual issue of patience and commitment on my end, but I believe other people might be held back from volunteering some of their time for the same reasons. This is why I feel that having a walk-in/phone-in type of service would be beneficial for individuals and organizations in need of (uncommitted, possibly one-time) volunteers. It takes a special kind of person to be able to have the discipline and scheduling moxy to carve out a slice of his/her life and devote it to becoming a committed volunteer to one organization. I applaud these people. I just think that it is heart breaking that so many organizations are really only able to handle (or are only looking for) that type of volunteer.

Also, I hear you. I know that there is a long list of things to do that many people could rattle off quickly. What I do not hear very often is specific details. That is what I'd hope would be provided at this walk in service. Instead of "There are Saturday morning feeding the homeless. There are tons of homeless shelters. There are domestic violence shelters. There is habitat for humanity. Sometimes churchs will do community service events too so you can join in with fellow Christians. There's pregnancy centers..."

Instead I'd like to hear "You can help feed the homeless breakfast from 6AM to 10AM Down on 13500 Main ST, and if you get there about 30 minutes early they can really use setup people" OR "This Saturday from 9AM to noon the homeless shelter could use people to (I don't know what you do at a homeless shelter so fill in this blank for me)"

The other ideas are great too, but if you listen to how you present them it leaves a lot of questions. That is where a walk-in place might come in handy. It answers those questions like, "OK, my friend JB told me that sometimes churches will do community service events. Can you tell me if there is one going on this weekend? Can you tell me when and where it is taking place and what kind of help they might be needing?" OR "I'd really like to help out at a pregnancy center. Where are they? What needs do they have right now? Am I able to fill those needs? What do I need to do to be qualified?"

I'm glad that you are helping me flesh out this idea more and more. I'm not always super clear with conveying my ideas to people so it helps to have someone going through the process with me. It is also really nice that you're excited about this. You were obviously in mind when I thought all of this, JB, and Joy will attest that I was thinking that you'd love something like this. In fact, you're exactly the kinda of person I have in mind, because your schedule goes from very busy to very free in waves. During your free time you are always wanting to help out, but then when the busy time comes having to keep commitments causes undue stress for you. I have other friends that feel the same way all the time. It would be awesome to have the waves of all these different schedules overlap in some way, and the best way I can think of right now is by having a walk-in, no commitment volunteer/charity organization matching service.

I understand what you are saying about more information being needed and I don't have that information. I'm sure walk in organizations are around and that you'll just that to find them, perhaps google is a good place to start since you don't have many contacts in Orlando. I figured the Gainesville volunteering was somewhat out of the question now since Joy won't be here anymore.

There are places where you can volunteer once or twice according to your schedule, I haven't really done any because i don't have a car and it's really hard to get around unless a friend agrees to go with you.

All these questions about where these things are, well if you want to help then it's your job to find out. In an ideal world these events would be well known so that we could all be informed, but we're not. So if you are serious about helping people then it's your responsbility to find out where you can fit in then act on the information you get. I don't like this at all. A lot of people would help out society if they had these details and information available to them readily so that on a free Saturday they could just grab the family and go.

I totally get what you are saying about the time waves and that's exactly why i haven't been able to volunteer as much as I wish I could (minus the car problem). You get involved somewhere then one semester school hits you hard with debates and numerous assignments and you no longer have the time, so in a lot of places it's hard because the goal is consistent volunteering, but I think it should be that way. I mean if this volunteering really was important in my mind, then i would make time for it, cut the little free time I had, decrease my hours of helping but stay in.

I don't know, i'm just thinking aloud, i'm not even editing cause i have to go to class soon.

I do totally get what you are saying though. It would be great if cities had a volunteer information center or directory. I have no time or desire to start that because what a project that would be, perhaps some people will do this someday.

Anyhow, I gotta go sit in class and play hearts on my laptop. MJ sends her love!

JB

volunteermatch.org : It isn't a bad site for getting a general idea what is requesting assitance in any area...I recall using it back in highschool...peace...I know this isn't really an answer to your issue, but it's one place to look, if you havent checked it out already

Nice. volunteermatch.org is pretty close to what I have in mind. I think it could be improved upon by a) getting its name out more, b) having physical locations (that would be really expensive though,) and c) allowing for both people looking for a commitment to an organization and those looking for a one-job event.

My interest in volunteering just started roughly a month ago, when I was brainstorming up some ideas of fun, out-of-the-norm things to do with Joy. Volunteering is something I just don't seem to do. Going right along with that is a general ignorance about how volunteering works. I know specifics because of things that I have done for community service such as Habitat for Humanity, American Cancer Association, Planned Parenthood, Boy Scouts, local schools, and local churches. Beyond working for these five organizations I am wholly ignorant, but wanting to learn more.

For Gainesville you can check with Eric Leightman, he runs the Homeless Council here. He'd probably have a few one time events that you can help out with.

For Orlando you can check out http://www.volunteermatch.org/orgs/org48201.html which is Restore Orlando (my old church used to do a lot of stuff with them, they're a Christian organization). Restore Orlando used to have feed the homeless dinners at least a couple of times a week.

I'd say try out habitat for humanity, they can always take people, and the requirements to do the job are that you care about doing it, and you can follow instructions. I know you well enough to say you're qualified. It sounds kinda like you're giving long diatribes of rationalization to hide the fact that you just don't feel like going out there and doing it. Just go do one, and decide afterwards whether you don't like it. It'll still be a useful experience regardless of the details.

I think your walk-in volunteer organization is a great idea! If it was well advertised, it would probably stay very busy. Everyone who commented has pretty much either told you "get involved with such-and-such" or "yeah, I have a similar problem with getting involved". That's awesome b/c they are all addressing your issue. Of the ones who are saying "get involved with such and such" not one has said a specific time or place that you can go (exactly your complaint!). The others agree that they have similar issues as you with not knowing exactly how to get involved or how to stay involved when life happens. It's great to read all of this a while after it's been posted b/c I can get a feel for the conversation on the whole and realize that whether intentional or not, the overall resounding response was actually agreement! Maybe the volunteering that we do together could focus on actually getting this type of organization up and running. How satisfying would that be? (: