Finding Volunteering Opportunities

jcravens42
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Finding Volunteering Opportunities

Howdy. I joined the Rational Responders network specifically to provide any support I can regarding volunteerism to atheists who want to make a difference in causes they believe in. With the increasing popularity and promotion of faith-based community action, I think atheists can feel left out, and they shouldn't; we have values and passions, and we want to give back to our communities just as much as anyone.

So, for my first post to the group, I will start with a list of web sites that list volunteering opportunities in the USA:

VolunteerMatch, http://www.volunteermatch.org

Idealist, http://www.idealist.org

Change.org, http://www.change.org

CraigsList, http://www.craigslist.com

Network for Good, http://www.networkforgood.org

http://www.1-800-volunteer.org/

ServeNet, http://servenet.org/

There's also your local volunteer center; you can find this via the Points of Light Foundation web site,
http://www.pointsoflight.org/centers/

There's also this government sponsored site, http://volunteer.gov/gov/ which provides volunteer positions through USA federal land agencies like Fish & Wildlife, Forest Service, National Parks, etc.

If you want to be a volunteer to help with the consequences of a natural disaster, such as Hurricane Katrina, you need to register and prepare NOW. Here's a web site where you can register and start your preparation so that you can help the next time disaster strikes:
http://www.helpindisaster.org/

 I would be interested to hear any of your stories about volunteering -- why you do it, what you have enjoyed, etc. -- and if you have ever faced any problems volunteering because of your atheism. 

 You can read more about me via my web site (which should be in my signature, if I've configured everything correctly...)


Renee Obsidianwords
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Volunteer Match

All-

I personally use volunteer match. You can access a list of opportunities by plugging in your zip code, the radius from that zip you are willing to volunteer and the area of interest. The list that is presented can then be filtered by location and date. Not only do you get a description of the opportunity (date, time required, a map) you will also be given a description of "who" may be a good fit for the event: Senior citizens, kids, groups etc.

Anyone looking to do some good within your community, I would point you to this website for sure.

-Renee

 

Slowly building a blog at ~

http://obsidianwords.wordpress.com/


Renee Obsidianwords
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bump

I am bumping hopefull to draw attention to this GREAT list of volunteer groups!

 

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Sapient
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I've posted your info on

I've posted your info on the homepage of atheistvolunteers.org in the hopes of getting the info out there faster: http://www.atheistvolunteers.org/node/35

 I don't have the time to research any of the orgs listed right now, so if anyone has anything positive or negative to report, please do so.

 


jcravens42
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a little more background on the list

I can attest that all of the volunteering databases are affiliated with nonprofit 501(c)(3) organizations, but beyond that -- different people like different features (and I would really like to hear who likes what).

VolunteerMatch is the most popular, by far. Change.org is the only one, as far as I know, that comes with a social networking component.
Idealist is globally-focused, while I'm relatively sure the others list only opportunities in the USA (though the organizations listed within the databases may be globally focused).

 

<><><><><><><><>
Jayne Cravens
http://www.coyotecommunications.com/volunteer/


jcravens42
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Craigslist

Oops! Per my earlier post -- Craigslist is NOT a 501(c)(3) organization, and isn't focused on listing volunteering opportunities -- it just has a space where organizations can do so. But Craigslist does *not* do any vetting of such listings, and I think churches and any other communities can, indeed, post under the volunteer section.

<><><><><><><><>
Jayne Cravens
http://www.coyotecommunications.com/volunteer/


Brian37
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Why do you have 3 different

Why do you have 3 different threads on this issue. It seems like a cover to advertise the website in your sig.

I wonder if the mods will condense those threads into one.  

"We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and nonbelievers."Obama
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Sapient
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Brian37 wrote: Why do you

Brian37 wrote:

Why do you have 3 different threads on this issue. It seems like a cover to advertise the website in your sig.

I wonder if the mods will condense those threads into one.

That's a concern I agree with.  If the purpose is self promotion it would be more effective in one thread.  If the purpose is volunteerism it would be more effective in one thread.  I don't want to take the time to list the reasons, just trust me.  I was working on the assumption that jcravens wasn't familiar with this, and was just trying to help.  

 Jcravens, our mutual causes would be served best if you kept them in one thread.  (including for the purposes of increasing the worth of coyotecommunications in google, google will weight it more heavily if it's all in one thread)

 


jcravens42
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Bye

The name of this branch of the forum is "Atheist Volunteers."

I've started three threads, all on-topic and each distinct, within this branch:

-- one is encouraging people to talk about their own volunteering

-- one is to talk about *online* volunteering

-- one is about how to *find* volunteering opportunities online

To combine these three distinct threads would be confusing and defeat the whole purpose of having different threads within a branch.

Since one person seems to think I have some kind of profit motive posting here (because, you know there's just SO much money in volunteer management consulting...), I would have been happy to take out the URL of my web site, if that's what the mods want.  You'll note, if you visited the volunteerism pages, that there is not one thing for sale on them. Nothing.

So many of the threads in the Atheist Volunteers branch are offtopic -- they have nothing to do with volunteering. I've been trying to actually post ONtopic. I've been completely transparent about why I'm posting here. I was really fired up and happy to find this web site, per having to sift-through so many government-sponsored resources focused on faith-based volunteering. I really wanted to contribute to the "cause." But if you don't want my recommendations, that's fine -- good luck, and I'll now withdraw from participating.

A shame -- I really wanted to help more atheist be volunteers.

 

<><><><><><><><>
Jayne Cravens
http://www.coyotecommunications.com/volunteer/


Renee Obsidianwords
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jcravens42 wrote:The name of

jcravens42 wrote:

The name of this branch of the forum is "Atheist Volunteers."

I've started three threads, all on-topic and each distinct, within this branch:

-- one is encouraging people to talk about their own volunteering

-- one is to talk about *online* volunteering

-- one is about how to *find* volunteering opportunities online

To combine these three distinct threads would be confusing and defeat the whole purpose of having different threads within a branch.

Since one person seems to think I have some kind of profit motive posting here (because, you know there's just SO much money in volunteer management consulting...), I would have been happy to take out the URL of my web site, if that's what the mods want.  You'll note, if you visited the volunteerism pages, that there is not one thing for sale on them. Nothing.

So many of the threads in the Atheist Volunteers branch are offtopic -- they have nothing to do with volunteering. I've been trying to actually post ONtopic. I've been completely transparent about why I'm posting here. I was really fired up and happy to find this web site, per having to sift-through so many government-sponsored resources focused on faith-based volunteering. I really wanted to contribute to the "cause." But if you don't want my recommendations, that's fine -- good luck, and I'll now withdraw from participating.

A shame -- I really wanted to help more atheist be volunteers.

 

 

I appreciate the list. BUT, I volunteer so it is near to my heart  Smiling

Slowly building a blog at ~

http://obsidianwords.wordpress.com/