I have always known, and will always know, exactly how long it has been since Hurricane Katrina hit the gulf coast of the United States.

The day of the storm, rain sheeted down the windows of my hospital room in Atlanta.

While coverage of the storm played on CNN, I labored and delivered my second child, my daughter.

On August 29th my daughter will turn five and it will have been five years since this natural disaster devastated the coasts of Mississippi and Louisiana.

I find myself revisiting my memories of the storm and that time in our nation’s history because today I learned about the Mississippi Case Management Consortium’s Adopt A Family program.

Nearly five years after Hurricane Katrina, about two thousand displaced residents are still waiting to go home.

The Adopt A Family project aims to connect these families with generous people who want to help them with the final steps of their recover.

Here are just a few of the many families that still need help:

• Ms. Rankin of Collins – needs $1,500 to purchase a meter and pole for utility hookups;
• Mrs. Spiers of Carriere – needs about $5,000 worth of repairs;
• Krause Family of Poplarville – need $14,600 to completely redo interior of house (wiring, sheetrock, roof repairs);
• Mrs. H. Williams of Picayune – needs $61,900 for a small 2-bedroom home on her property; and
• Mr. Shehorn of Pass Christian – needs a complete rebuild for himself and his elderly parents à $119,000.

This summer, when all grant funding will have been expended, The Mississippi Case Management Consortium will be closing down.

Their goal is to help as many of these families as they can before they close their doors.

You and your friends can be a part of the solution.

To lend your support, simply visit the Adopt A Katrina Family web site to find a family that needs your help.

Contact information for a family representative is listed on each family’s page.

Once contacted, the family representative will guide you through a few simple steps  to ensure that your fully tax-deductible donation gets to the family you designate.

If you’re not in a position to adopt a family yourself, you can help by:

• organizing members of your house of worship to support a family;
• encouraging your sorority sisters, fraternity brothers or other association members  to Adopt A Katrina Family;
• earmarking  funds from a bake sale or garage sale help a family; or
• spreading the word to your network of friends by becoming a fan of the project on and posting a message of support on your Facebook wall.



Today’s post is a guest post from John at Late Night Musings.

For many of you reading this, I know I am preaching to the choir, but bear with me.

If you accept the definition of volunteerism as the giving of one’s  time, talents or financial wherewithal to assist others in need, then you would have to agree that it has been around in the United States since the colonists first came here.  Times were tough and circumstances difficult, consequently helping one’s neighbor, helping the community they lived in was essential for the survival of all.  It has always been based on those more fortunate helping those less fortunate.

Later as society developed, organized volunteerism came to be.  The basis for this was a recognition that our community extended far beyond our front door.  We could identify with and relate to those in our state and in our country that had needs essential for their basic survival.  In time that idea expanded; there was recognition that the world was our community.

And so we come to today.  We continue to carry on that great tradition of helping others.  Our lineage for that can be traced back to the earliest settlers.  It is a lineage that disregards genealogy but embraces a common thread back to the birth of our nation.  Be you Democrat or Republican, Liberal or Conservative, we are one.  There is a commitment among us to help others in time of need.

For some it is contributing their time, talents and money to help someone in the community.  Most often it is not organized but simply wells up from caring about the welfare of others.  In other cases, the driving force is an organization dedicated to helping those in need, wherever they may be.  Again, it often is volunteering one’s time and talents to assist others.  When that isn’t possible, it is contributing money so those who do have the time and talents so they can help.

That you are reading this blog says much about you and your involvement in volunteering -  in helping others.  I believe there are millions of you and each one has a special story to tell of your experience.  Sometimes it is the sharing of that experience that serves to finally convince someone else to step up to the plate and get involved.

So with that thought in mind and with the approval of the bloggers here, I am asking those of you who have a story to tell about your volunteering experience to write and share it with others here.  Be it great or small, no effort in helping others is insignificant.

You can submit your personal experience by simply sending an email to [] with your story.

There’s no special prize for having your story accepted, but then as a volunteer you know that’s not what is important.

The only prize is the recognition among your peers that you too are fighting the good fight.

Yesterday, the Volunteer Center of Bergen County, New Jersey published their .

I particularly liked the suggestions the guide offered about what you should consider before volunteering.

Things to Consider Before You Begin to Volunteer…

How much time do you have to volunteer?

How much of a commitment can you make? A one-time project? A week, a month, a year?

Do you want to volunteer alone, with friends, family, or co-workers?

Some questions to ask:

Skills/Interests/Experience

Why do you want to volunteer?

What do you want to do?

Do you have interests, hobbies or experience that you want to share?

How do you want to volunteer – directly with people? in an office? on a committee or Board?

Setting

Where would you like to volunteer — hospital, school, nursing home, office, gift or thrift shop,
shelter/soup kitchen, sports/recreation program, camp, park, museum, theater?

How will you get there? Do you need a car? Is it accessible by public transportation?

What kind of atmosphere would you like? Quiet? Fast-paced?

Do you want to volunteer inside or outside?

Who do you want to help?

Infants, pre-schoolers, elementary-, middle- or high-school students, adults, the elderly, pPeople with physical, mental or learning disabilities?

Do you want to serve individuals (one-on-one) or groups of people?

Personal considerations

Do you have any physical or mental limitations that you should consider when choosing a volunteer
job?

Do you know someone who would be a reference if you needed one? Have you asked them in
advance?

How to interview for a volunteer position

Always be open and honest when you discuss opportunities for volunteer work.

The more you and an organization know about each other, the more comfortable you will be in volunteering!

Ask lots of questions…

What is the purpose/mission of the organization? What programs/services does the agency offer?

What are the responsibilities of the volunteer job?

What kind of commitment is required?

Will you be trained? By whom? Who will supervise you?

Will you be working with other volunteers? With staff? Alone?

Are there costs involved, such as lunches, meetings, travel, uniform? Will you be reimbursed for your
expenses?

What about parking? Do you have to pay?

Does the agency have liability insurance that covers volunteers?

Are there policies and procedures for volunteers?

Once you’ve given these questions some thought, there are a number of ways to get started.

Find the nearest HandsOn Network Action Center.

Search our national database of volunteer opportunities by impact area.

Download the All For Good search-able projects database widget to your personal web page.

If you can’t find a project that works for you, consider calling your local  library (also check out www.publiclibraries.com), neighborhood school, house of worship, senior center, municipal building/recreation dept., fire department, ambulance corps, or police department to see what opportunities they may have for you.

If you’re a self-starter, plan a project yourself.

If you’ve noticed that something needs to be done in your community, organize!

Plan a project and recruit your friends!

For more ideas, visit the Volunteer Center of Bergen County’s blog and download the full

Updated to add: See also the ideas posted at the IU Undergraduate blog.

by Greg Heinrich

“We will have to repent not merely for the hateful words and actions of the bad people, but for the appalling silence of the good people,” so said Martin Luther King, Jr.

Recently, I have found myself struggling with a sort of silence.

My organization provides two hours each week to volunteer during normal business hours.  It’s a policy that is perfectly aligned with our core focus: inspiring, equipping, and mobilizing people to take action that changes the world.  My workload in my current position seems to consume me during the business day, and before I know it the day is finished or the week is finished, and I have failed to volunteer.  But when I look a little further into the time-consuming nature of my day’s workload, I am really saying that my responsibilities at work sometimes hold priority over my organization’s volunteering policy.  Lately, that has never been more true.

The rhythmic routine of the day-to-day grind can hold a certain hypnotism that makes volunteering on the front lines feel like an unfamiliar part of my work that has been pushed to the edges of the priority grid.  This is why taking time for self-reflection is critical to ensuring my priorities are in line.  Without taking that time to reflect on a regular basis, I find it all too easy to slip into a routine that deflects a sense of personal responsibility to utilize the volunteer policy my employer has afforded.

The reason I embarked upon a path in the nonprofit sector was because of AmeriCorps.  It gave me a feeling that if I was passionate about or committed to an idea or issue, that I could create a positive impact.  My AmeriCorps term was a hands on experience that placed me on the front lines of education, and empowered me to meet challenges facing today’s youth.  It was grassroots, raw, and up close access to the challenges and solutions to those challenges, and I wanted more of it.

Albeit more hands off, I saw and and still do see my current organization as an extension of the opportunity to confront problems with a group of colleagues that are intense and passionate about making a positive impact on their community, their country, and their world.  Somewhere over these last several months though, I’ve wandered from center, and momentarily forgotten that inspiring, equipping, and mobilizing people to take action that changes the world plays itself out in the grassroots efforts that are grounded in the hands on volunteer experience.  Taking two hours per week to volunteer is a great way to stay connected to this important concept.

However, the balancing act between making a difference through the everyday work that explicitly pervades my organization’s overarching mission and making a difference through a volunteer policy that lacks an obvious connection to the success of my day-to-day objectives is a challenge.  But, it is not an insurmountable challenge as long as I take the time for reflect on the alignment of my priorities.  So, starting yesterday, I reset my “volunteer on” button, and headed out of the office (during business hours) to continue my mentoring commitment with the East Atlanta Kids Club.

Greg Heinrich