Adventures in Volunteering
A blog by the staff and friends of the Volunteer Center.
June 10, 2011
Mind-Blowing Gestures
By Emma Margraf, Acting Executive Director
There's a little boy flying alone sitting next to me on the airplane coming home from New Orleans, and I asked him if he knew how to put on his seat belt. He took a look at it, I pointed to where the two ends attach, and he fastened the belt and pulled it tight, saying, "I'm a smart kid. I can tell what the first letters of people's names are just when they say them out loud". It's the first time he's been on a plane, and I tried to answer his questions as best I could. He said I was nice. Now he's passed out asleep, face first in his seat. I got him some juice for when he wakes up.
There are all kinds of ways to look out for folks, and I've learned that over an over this week. For the two months since Sara died I've often felt quite alone - it's probably natural, given the circumstances. People have really reached out to me, and I appreciate that every day, but it wasn't until I landed in New Orleans and spent two days with HandsOn staff and other Volunteer Center Directors from across the country that I didn't feel lonesome anymore.
They asked me to give a short speech about Sara, and I did that at the end of the second day, after I'd spent a lot of great time with my colleagues. I talked about Sara and how everyone in the room had a life story familiar with hers. I told a story about how Sara and Tom Kondon devised a plan to change the world on the back of a napkin, a plan which began with the Komachin Middle School MLK Day of Service, and about the mural that Komachin Middle School kids painted in our office that Sara loved and it was going to break my heart to leave when we move out of our office this summer. At the end of the speech, Gary Renville and the staff of the HandsOn Affiliate Advancement team presented me with a copy of the mural they'd made so that we could take it with us. It looks just like it. I nearly burst into tears.
People are capable of amazing things. That was the most thoughtful gesture I could have imagined, and I was incredibly moved. It often occurs to all of us to do things like this, but how often do we brush those thoughts aside, in favor of the more pressing thoughts of daily life, because it's too high a standard for reaching out? I know that I pass up a lot of opportunities to go the extra mile for people, and that's something I'm going to change. I'm going to pay them back by making sure that our work includes this level of caring for my community, everywhere I can.
At the opening session for the conference, we saw a video of Branford Marsalis and Harry Connick Jr.'s partnership with Habitat for Humanity to build Musician's Village, a collection of houses in the 9th Ward where musicians displaced from Hurricane Katrina and it's aftermath can live in community. They have a community center, the Ellis Marsalis Center for music, where anyone can stop by to play or learn, talk or hang out. 
Tara Smith from Seattle Works and I got it into our heads that we wanted to see the village in person, so we took a cab out to the 9th ward. The Cabdriver was a little confused about why we wanted to go out there, and when we got there and he found out we would only be a few minutes he said he'd wait there for us for free. All of these house look colorful and new, he said, you see these houses start to look different, you turn right round and come back, you hear?
The houses were beautiful. Built to stand up in a storm, they are lived in by people who love them, clearly, and decorate with beautiful landscaping and art. As usual in New Orleans, every time we saw someone they'd great us cheerfully and say things like, "can't complain" when we asked how their day was going. 
Our cabdriver picked us back up, and said he wasn't going to turn the meter back on, but that while we were here we needed to see the rest.
He drove us through the 9th ward and talked about how there is no emergency medical service down there, there are no grocery stores, there are no businesses. We got out of the cab and saw a small park where there was a display with some facts about the rebuilding process, along with two sets of front steps and foundations of houses, and our cabdriver said to us, "lots of people came back, and this is all they saw".
We drove through the streets where Brad Pitt is building beautiful houses along side residents who will now save so much money on solar energy that they can sell some of it back. They've built 100 houses so far through the Make It Right Foundation, but 4,000 lost their homes. And seven years later, they still lose power a lot, they still have lots of setbacks, and they still don't have any businesses.
The cabdriver gave us this free tour because he wanted to tell the story - and so I am telling it now, the best I can. His seventeen year marriage ended when his job obligated him to come back and his wife's obligated her to stay in Houston. She was going to stay there for a year, but the seperation was too much for them, and she stayed in Texas. Of his ten neighbors who were married before the storm, 6 of them divorced soon after. People came back either because they love the spirit of the city or because they had nowhere else to go - and some people, he said, think that the crime and poverty was so bad that we should have just let the 9th ward wash away in Katrina, to start a new.
And to be honest, that seems like what might have happened. They're just at the start of a long rebuilding process, and they have so little. Some people keep the markings on their houses that signify that the search and rescue team had been there, because they don't want to forget. Some people want to forget. Some streets have hand made street signs because no one has been able to come out and put up regular ones.
What's emerging has great hope. It's focused on green building and sustainability and music. These are three of my favorite things, and I look forward to going back to New Orleans again - the next time to help build - and the time after that to see what miracles have been completed. It's a beautiful place, with amazing wonderful people.
In the meantime, I'm headed back to my own amazing people. As usual, I have a flood of thoughts about what we could do that's new, better, or more relevant to community needs. In a few weeks our portable mural will arrive in the mail, and I'll be reminded all over again that Amy Smith, Gary Renville, Zach, and Marjie B are some of the best and most amazing people I'm lucky enough to know. And I'll be looking for a way to do for someone else what they did for me this week and I'll be glad to have the opportunity.
May 9, 2011
Flash Mobs and Community Engagement
By Emma Margraf, Acting Executive Director
The other day, I stood in front of the staff of GHB insurance teaching the principals of flash mobs and explaining their relationship to community engagement. At that moment, I realized it has only been five weeks since Sara died and the Volunteer Center staff was left to pick up the pieces and move forward with our new reality without her leadership.
Perhaps at first it seems these two things have little to do with each other, but on second glance it all makes sense. Well, maybe on third or fourth glance... but here we go.
It was Sara who gave me the opportunity to do my first flash mob two years ago in the street in downtown Olympia, to Abba's "Take A Chance On Me". I told that story at her memorial, and afterwards our insurance agent called to ask me if I would help his company with a secret plan they have in motion. I'm not allowed to tell you now, but I will say that you all should really be at the next Thurston County Chamber After Hours Mixer. It's going to be a good time.
One of the principals of flash mobs is that they have a way of including everyone, and making everyone feel included. Alienation is one of the hardest community problems to fight, perhaps the most pervasive and most destructive. It's the tricky devil that contributes to homelessness and hunger and poverty and neglect. If you are hungry, and you can't reach out to let someone know that - if no one feels empowered to bring you a casserole or give you a ride to the food bank - the likeliehood you'll stay hungry is so much higher. People feel silly (at best) asking for help, when there are so many people eager to help them - and THAT'S silly.
Alienation is so much easier to shake off when everyone is dancing and acting like a goofball. So, at the recent Voluntony Awards, we sent volunteers up the aisle of the Capital Theater lip syncing to the Black Eyed Peas remix of "I've had the Time of My Life". Community Champion Award Winner Jeremy Lushene got on one knee and pretended to sing to Mrs. Washington, Lisa Bluhm, who pulled out a hairbrush and pretended to sing back to him. In the face of that, how can you be afraid to feel silly?
Lead with Experience award winner Elaine "Sweet Pea" Daniels was in the front row for this event, and when we all ran forward to dance the steps we didn't really know at all (having practiced for about ten minutes), Sweet Pea and her crew clapped along happily, moving back and forth in their seats with great cheer. Sweet Pea answers the phone at the Senior Center in Belfair, and when we called to let them know that she'd won we could hear the whole place cheering for her. If you go visit Sweet Pea, she'll make you a cup of coffee and make sure you make friends. She wants you to know that you have a place to be.
It's been five weeks since Sara died, and GHB insurance is donating $500 in exchange for our help getting volunteers to do something totally goofy, in Sara's honor. That's the way they choose to support the programs they know are important community services: our database of volunteer opportunities, our skilled volunteer program, and our volunteer management trainings. Their $500 will underwrite our training scholarship program, so that strapped non-profit staffers don't have to give up the education they deserve. Thank you, GHB!
There are good days, terrible days, and everything in between. Terrible things happen, tragedy strikes, and people get completely knocked out by the force of the burdens the world dumps on their doorstep, without warning, on what was supposed to be an average Tuesday morning. We certainly felt that way when Sara's father called that morning to say she'd died at 36. But the Volunteer Center was built to survive the terrible days and rebuild lives and communities. We get up as fast as we can and build wonderful ones, like the night we celebrated the Voluntonies Award Show, or the afternoons we'll spend in Advanced Volunteer Program Management Seminars, or the days we'll spend training volunteer leaders this summer.
If there is a problem you want to solve in your community, give us a call. If you are interested in attending a training, please check our trainings page for more information. If you want to ensure our trainings continue, click here to donate in support of them. If you want to organize a goofy flash mob at an event you are having, give us a call anytime: we have our hairbrushes ready.
April 22, 2011
Dance, Dance, Wherever You May Be: Thoughts on the Voluntonies
By Emma Margraf, Acting Executive Director
There is great value in silliness. There's a thrill that comes from dancing in public. And there is exhilaration in being recognized in public for work done for free - work done in service of things you find important enough to give up your weekends or evenings for, work that you would have done even without recognition.
Silliness, exhilaration, and the thrills of public dancing: sounds like a great Friday night!
Welcome to the "Voluntony Awards" - the event where volunteers are celebrated like the celebrities they are! On April 29th at 6:30 at the Capital Theater in Olympia, please join us along with hosts Joe Hyer and Lisa Bluhm, the reigning Mrs. Washington 2011. This ceremony will celebrate eight awards winners plus many more amazing nominees who were selected by their community because the impact they've made for causes they love. There will be red carpet interviews, entertainment, fancy dress... and did I mention dancing?
At the Volunteer Center, we've got a well-deserved reputation for flash mobs. (Have you all seen this? www.youtube.com/volunteercenterlmt#p/u/9/ZB6-bA28Kyc) And we like to be in the same room with dancers, friends, and especially volunteer superstars. That's why we love the Voluntonies, and we think you will too.
During this tough time at the Volunteer Center, we've received an incredible outpouring of support, and everyone has asked us how they can help. We're working harder than ever to ensure that volunteers have opportunities to serve their community, that agencies and organizations can find volunteers and learn to use them well, and that skilled volunteers are able to find ways to use their talents to build capacity of local nonprofits to solve community problems.
If you'd like to help the Volunteer Center ensure that our mission continues, here are a few ways you can help:
1. First, come on down to the Voluntony Awards on April 29 , enjoy the show, and say hi!
2. Sponsor our Intern: We have a Volunteer Matchmaking Specialist intern starting in May. She will be devoting her time to making sure our database of volunteer opportunities is serving its purpose, and she'll be on the phone with each and every agency in our database this summer, making sure they are getting the most out of the service. During the summer, she needs to take the train back and forth between Vancouver, Washington and Olympia for school. If you can support a few of those trips by donating Amtrak tickets or Amtrak points, please let us know.
3. Make a donation in Sara Ballard's honor to support our Volunteer Management Training Programs: This summer, the Volunteer Center will offer trainings with nationally recognized experts including "Advanced Volunteer Program Management," "Get On Board!" for boardmembers, "Community Engagement and Volunteerism," "Marketing In Local Markets: How to Make Clients Love You," and "So ... You Are Running A Volunteer Program In Your ‘Spare Time' " for busy volunteer managers. Your support would allow us to offer more trainings at reduced or no cost to local nonprofit groups.
4. Donate your skills: We need a web specialist, a graphic specialist, and probably other skills we haven't yet thought to ask for. All donations of time and talent are welcome, and very much appreciated.
We thank you, more than we can say, for making it so clear in the last few weeks how important the Volunteer Center is to you. We feel it's important too, and we need you to help us continue this work. Please let us know that we can count on you!
And next Friday, we'll see you on the red carpet!
April 12, 2011
Spring is here: A great time to volunteer
By Emma Margraf, Acting Executive Director
I walked to work on Friday last week - it was sunny outside, stay at home parents were drinking coffee on their front porches while their kids played in the yard, neighbors were working in their gardens, and tulips are popping up all over. The Olympia Farmer's Market opened this weekend, and it sure is nice to see the beginning of spring. The staff at the Volunteer Center is feeling pretty grateful for our community right now, and while we don't always have answers for the people who are asking us how they can help, it's really nice to know you are there.
The truth about Volunteer Centers is that tough times are why we are here. When disasters strike, when things fall apart, and when people need help, volunteers are the people who step in to fill the gap, fix the problem, figure out the solution. Our office is full of beautiful pictures of volunteers in the floods of Lewis County cleaning up gigantic messes and making food for stranded residents. For every occasion, there is food. The Snohomish Volunteer Center brought cookies to Sara's memorial while the King County folks got busy organizing carpools, because that's what we do. We're doers.
In May we have a skilled Volunteer Specialist joining us for the summer; a lot of you will be hearing from her as she reaches out to area agencies to help them with their volunteer opportunities on our database. We'll also be hosting a training on May 11th on building a better board, taught by Liz Heath from the Non-Profit Center. This summer we'll be doing Volunteer Program Management 101 and 201 as part of the Summer of Service, and Volunteer Leaders will spread out across the area to do their own volunteer projects.
And of course, the Voluntonies Award Show is April 29th at the Capitol Theater in Olympia, and we can't think of a better way to end a tough month in our lives than to look out at all of the folks who have done just amazing things in their communities. That's the way the world keeps turning. We are volunteers, each of us. And in tough times volunteers get up and give back.
In the coming weeks, we will be planting a tree for Sara at Komachin Middle School in Lacey, a fitting tribute given that this year Komachin held its third annual Day of Caring in honor of Dr. Martin Luther King, an event where the entire school spreads out throughout the community for service projects that range from helping their elementary schools to reading at the Senior Center to planting trees along the Woodland Greenway Trail. Sara started that project with Komachin teacher Tom Kondon, who brought cards written by 8th graders to Sara's parents last week, who wrote about how much the day means to them, promising that they'd always be volunteers.
Like I said last week, I'm so lucky to be here, and to have this job, and to work with and for all of you. Happy spring to everyone!
