FAQs
About the Virtual Volunteering Project
virtual volunteering project
- History
- Why Virtual Volunteering?
- Overview of the Virtual Volunteering Project
- Most Recent Support and Funding
History
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The Virtual Volunteering Project was launched in 1996 to encourage and assist in the development of volunteer activities that can be completed off-site via the Internet. It quickly went from a cutting-edge idea to a nationally-recognized resource. The Virtual Volunteering Project has been featured in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Los Angeles Times, the Washington Post, the San Jose Mercury News, and many online publications (view these articles).
There are thousands (millions?!) of people who cannot volunteer onsite, or aren't interested in doing so, who are willing to do so via their home or work computers and the Internet. There are also thousands of people who would like to provide online volunteering in addition to their onsite volunteering. The Virtual Volunteering Project was started because Steve Glikbarg and Cindy Shove, co-founders of Impact Online (IOL), had been contacted by numerous individuals who wanted to help an agency via virtual volunteering... but few organizations could be found who knew how to involve such people. Steve and Cindy have been talking about and benefiting from online volunteering since 1994 (when IOL first went on the Web), and IOL's own programs and services would not have come into being without the contributions of numerous volunteers, on and offline.
The Virtual Volunteering Project is the only organization of its kind: it encourages and assists in the development and success of volunteer activities that can be completed via the Internet, and help volunteer managers use cyberspace to work with ALL volunteers. The Project is not a matching service; instead, it builds the capacity of both agencies and volunteers, to make online service possible.
Successful virtual volunteering takes much more than a database of online service opportunities -- the Virtual Volunteering Project provides the critical information and background to help both organizations and volunteers engage in effective, meaningful, mission-based online service.
During its first phase, 1996 - 1998, the VV Project was made possible by a seed grant from the James Irvine Foundation. Additional support in this first phase of the Project came from:
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the David and Lucile Packard Foundation
the Morino Institute
and the Mitsubishi Electric America Foundation.
The Project became part of the Volunteerism and Community Engagement Initiatives at the Charles A. Dana Center, University of Texas at Austin, in the Fall of 1998. While at the Dana Center, the staff and volunteers of the VV Project frequently collaborated with other Dana Center programs.
The Project remains at the University of Texas.