December 2020: The US Federal Communications Commission (FCC) hosted an excellent webinar that presented a panel of representatives from virtual volunteering initiatives - nonprofits that have programs that involve online volunteers primarily, rather than traditional programs that added an online volunteering component. The webinar panelists talked mostly about the specifics of how their initiatives involve online volunteers (the exact roles that volunteers undertake), how those volunteers are supported and how those volunteers are central to their initiative's online program delivery and mission. Jayne Cravens has summarized the webinar here.
November 2020: Virtual Volunteering: Making an Impact From Home During a Global Pandemic. A report from the International Association for Volunteer Effort. IAVE has been slow, even reluctant, to talk much about virtual volunteering over the years, but like many nonprofits, charities and other programs around the world, the global pandemic has prompted them to ramp up their efforts to finally embrace such. The report has some unfortunate statements, like "Information and Communications Technology for Development (ICT4D) is a relatively new term" (it's not at all), never mentions the importance of accessibility of online tools for people with disabilities, and offers no acknowledgement of the many, many nonprofits, charities and NGOs, many in the developing world, that have been involving online volunteers successfully since the 1990s and proven that it is a successful, credible way to engage communities. Another unfortunate statement from the report is what it says is the first step in setting up a corporate employee virtual volunteering program: "What is the targeted number of volunteers or hours?" (the first step should be finding out what the nonprofit, charity or school NEEDS, what its clients and students NEED). But the report also has several strengths. For instance, it embraces political efforts by volunteers to pressure for governmental and societal change as a part of virtual volunteering, as such involves using online tools to mobilize and give voice to volunteers - something many traditional volunteer centers have refused to do for many years. It also has several case studies from many different countries, though much of it is from the corporate volunteer point of view, rather than the host organization point of view.
November 20, 2020: Salesforce Women’s Network and the Cherie Blair Foundation for Women are partnering. Salesforce employees will deliver professional mentoring through the Foundation to female entrepreneurs in low and middle income countries. Eight business leaders from Salesforce Women’s Network have committed to the programme as mentors from November 2020, who will help to develop and grow women entrepreneurs over a 12-month period. Each mentor will be matched with a woman mentee at a crucial stage in her business, in a year-long relationship of professional support and development, conducted through the Foundation’s newly-redeveloped online Mentoring platform.
November 16, 2020: An Albuquerque elementary school and a local tutoring organization are piloting an online mentoring program to help cultivate students’ love for reading, converting an existing, traditional, face-to-face program to a virtual setting. Lew Wallace Elementary School and Albuquerque Oasis Intergenerational Tutoring Program are joining elders in the community with elementary students virtually. The Albuquerque Oasis tutoring program director Vicki DeVigne worried about the tutors being able to connect online with students. “Not to in any way generalize too much, but a lot of volunteers in demographic that I work with do not necessarily want to do a lot of things online,” DeVigne said. “The volunteers have really stepped out of their comfort zone because they really want to make this work for students.” The program was profiled by KRQE.
November 12, 2020: A Kansas State University Libraries project is mobilizing online volunteers to transcribe and translate historic cookbooks to make them available digitally to the public. The Department of Special Collections has over 250 cookbook manuscripts dating from the late 1600s to the 21st century from various countries and in a variety of languages such as German, French, Spanish and Hebrew. “The collaborative nature of this online project means that anyone in the world can view the cookbooks and help us transcribe and even translate them.” More info on the project.
October 27, 2020: The New York Times did an article on seniors who have switched from traditional, onsite volunteering to virtual volunteering. Jayne's thoughts about the article: I am not surprised at all that the online volunteers profiled in this NYT story are people who already had an established relationship with the nonprofits they are now helping as online volunteers - that's something that's usual for online volunteers even when there isn't a pandemic going on (as noted in The Last Virtual Volunteering Guidebook. I'm not surprised that these experienced, traditional volunteers are finding themselves spending MORE time as online volunteers. I am very glad the article spotlighted senior citizens as the online volunteers in this story, not just as the recipients of service. I just wish this story had talked to more nonprofits to talk about how they are creating activities and roles for volunteers, what challenges they are facing, etc.
October 2020: October is Health Literacy Month. The Biomedical Library at the University of Pennsylvania is inviting UPENN students to participate in the National Library of Medicine's #citeNLM Wikipedia Edit-a-thon to edit child and maternal health-related pages on Wikipedia. No prior experience with Wikipedia is necessary for this volunteer activity. There are two ways to participate: Option #1: This is asychronous virtual volunteer activity that you can do on a computer with Internet access. Set aside some time on Thursday October 29th (or any day of your choice). Follow the instructions available here. Option #2: Join the National Library of Medicine's virtual live Edit-a-thon on Thursday October 29th from 1pm to 3pm Eastern Time. More information.
October 12, 2020: A milestone has been reached: more than 100 virtual volunteering research articles have been found, dating back to 1997 and most with a university association. These research articles are all listed here at the Virtual Volunteering Wiki. Jayne Cravens' blog commemorates this milestone.
October 1, 2020: Compilation of ways libraries are engaging online volunteers. Per a question on the TechSoup Community Forum, Jayne Cravens compiled and posted a list of the ways libraries large and small are engaging online volunteers, particularly teenagers. A few programs pre-dated the global pandemic but several were launched after March 2020. If you have additions, please comment on the thread on TechSoup.
October 1, 2020: Throughout the month of October, Lenovo employees will engage in virtual volunteering, providing virtual mentorships, book readings, career shadowing, and constructing a special STEM activity book for pediatric hospital patients. In many projects around the world, employees worked with existing community partners to determine how they could safely continue their annual day of service. The focus on checking in with existing partners and determining a way to help them has benefited many NGOs that have had to drastically shift their approach or face new challenges during the pandemic. Projects are led by individuals in each office who volunteer to organize a project for their office colleagues. With regular alignment and guidance from Lenovo’s global philanthropy team, volunteer project leaders have taken Lenovo’s community outreach to scale since its beginnings in 2017. They were also helped by early testing with virtual volunteerism through projects from Lenovo’s Summer interns. "Leaders have demonstrated agility and dedication by shifting from providing in-person mentorship to virtual interviews and panels conducted through NGO partners."
September 30, 2020: From Volunteer Vibe, a blog published by Volunteer Canada: profile of a refugee newcomer support organization pivoting to virtual volunteering. Together Project, a charitable initiative of MakeWay, connects refugee newcomers and Canadians to build stronger, more integrated communities. Based in the Greater Toronto Area, its flagship Welcome Group program matches groups volunteers with newly arrived refugees for six months of social and integration support. When the COVID-19 pandemic hit and the lockdown occurred in March, Together Project had about 150 volunteers who were already participating in six-month matches with Government-Assisted Refugees, and we were just launching a new pilot program to match another 150 volunteers with refugee claimants. We realized that we had to transition our Welcome Group Program to a virtual model, and fast – this was a precarious situation for an already vulnerable population. The question was how we could best manage this pivot. Our existing model already incorporated some online tools, but we discovered through a needs assessment process with both volunteers and newcomers that we needed a deeper overhaul of the program for it to really work. We had already been familiar with the standards of practice outlined in the Canadian Code for Volunteer Involvement (CCVI) as they had provided much needed structure to our existing program design... we looked at each of the CCVI standards of practice as pivot points for how to map existing programmatic components onto virtual platforms...We looked at how we could modify our orientation and training materials (standard 8) to better fit our focus on remote social support. Shifting our intake and orientation sessions online was fairly straightforward; the challenge lay in modifying (and re-modifying) the content to provide practical examples and stories that would make volunteer tasks and responsibilities more relatable to new participants. We also quickly learned that while a two-hour orientation session can work well in-person, it can be hard to maintain focus on a Zoom call that goes on much longer than an hour – better to shorten the session by refocusing on the essentials.
September 28, 2020: Global Health Virtual Volunteering Opportunities for UK clinicians. With funding from Health Education England (HEE), the Tropical Health and Education Trust (THET) has been offering capacity development focused volunteering opportunities for clinicians in the UK's National Health Service (NHS). THET is now offering a range of virtual volunteering opportunities with partner facilities in a number of low- and middle-income countries. Volunteers are eligible only if they currently are working for the UK National Health Service or allied quasi-non-governmental organisation.
September 25, 2020: Coach-A-Kid Enid is partnering with the Public Library of Enid and Garfield Counties in Oklahoma to offer online mentoring services to improve academic achievement with a focus on reading and math, building self-esteem, establishing positive relationships and to help children overcome negative behaviors. The mentoring program had to discontinue its traditional in-person, in-school model, because of health concerns and access issues in the schools. One of three study rooms on the ground floor of the library has been converted to a mentoring room, with a table, chairs, a large monitor and camera. The space can be used for youth to connect with a mentor anywhere in the world, for local mentors to connect with kids, or for in-person mentoring, for those who meet COVID-19 prevention criteria. The space and equipment already were available, so no fundraising or budget changes were necessary. 21 mentors signed up for this year. The goal is to provide a mentor for every student in Enid Public Schools. And a comment from Jayne: it's another example of a program being successful at virtual volunteering because they already have experience doing offline, in-person what they want to do online: training mentors, onboarding volunteers, having students ready for volunteers as soon as they are available, etc.
September 23, 2020: The United Philanthropy Forum, with US$9.1 million in grant funding provided by the Gates Foundation, announced that its newly created Momentum Fund was awarding US$8.5 million in grants averaging US$65,900 each to 129 nonprofits providing Covid-19 relief funding in the form of grants and direct support to organizations serving under-resourced Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) communities. Another US$1.2 million went to VolunteerMatch, which allows nonprofits to recruit volunteers for specific projects. The Gates Foundation grant allows the organization to further transform its platform to not only provide virtual volunteering, but to help nonprofits learn how to create those opportunities. More at this article.
September 16, 2020: For the past 26 years, hundreds of thousands of volunteers across the US have donated their time onsite, in-person, to help restore and improve public lands in the USA on National Public Lands Day. The celebration this year will be a mix of onsite and virtual activities on Saturday, September 26 at 10 am. EDT, presented as a virtual, musical tour by volunteers and employees through select public lands sites across the USA, as well as educational events and other online activities. This online event will showcase a "virtual road trip," presented by Corazón Latino, with musical performances from local artists at some of the USA's most scenic public lands sites, including Joshua Tree National Park, Carson National Forest, Waimea Canyon State Park, and Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens in Washington, DC. Event site on Facebook. Press release about the event.
September 10, 2020: Purdue Farmer-to-Farmer Program Goes Virtual. Purdue University is switching to a virtual volunteering model for its USAID Farmer-to-Farmer program supporting Trinidad and Tobago. Purdue's F2F provides technical assistance from U.S. volunteers to farmers, farm groups, agribusinesses, and other agriculture sector institutions in developing and transitional countries. Purdue says the virtual assignments will provide both real-time and pre-recorded trainings. The assignments will have a deliverable-based program with a longer timeline. The first virtual volunteering assignment will provide the Network of Rural Women Producers Trinidad and Tobago with training in online event hosting and social media marketing, helping women learn how to set up a virtual market and launch their first virtual event. The second virtual volunteering assignment will assist the agricultural arm of the Unemployment Relief Programme in Tobago, with an online volunteer providing assistance so members of the agricultural arm of URP-Tobago will be able to set up their own nursery and manage it effectively to produce healthy young plants.
September 9, 2020: Virtual volunteering in the land of lakes and volcanoes. "I received an email from Outreach360, an organization I had volunteered with during my 2019 spring break, teaching English in the Dominican Republic. This time, they invited me to become an instructor for a virtual STEM summer camp... During our orientation, (online) volunteers participated in training exercises, and we selected foundational materials to start our first classes from a plethora of educational resources in science, technology, engineering and math. But I had some doubts." Brandon Roy offers a first-person account of what it was like in his first virtual volunteering experience, teaching middle and high school–aged students regarding STEM subjects. "I was almost never able to maintain a stable internet connection with all nine students for a whole class period. This required flexibility, something I’d never needed sitting in large college lecture halls. The students were eager to reconnect or get the homework assignment from a teacher or classmate; truly passionate learners are part of this program. However, I also used TikTok, virtual experiments and interactive slideshows to keep the learning fun and engaging...My students taught me how to have a fun class over Zoom even though they were many miles away. I never felt more connected to others, and I’m grateful for all the memories and bonds made during my internship."
September 8, 2020: As with so many other things – school, work, major political conventions – the coronavirus pandemic has forced Jane Fonda's Fire Drill Friday demonstrations to go virtual. Each week, Jane Fonda now hosts Firedrill Fridays online to educate and rally her "virtual volunteer army" regarding climate change. She conducts video chats with prominent political, social and activist figures and hosts teach-ins with scientists, professors and other experts. Fonda says a recent Friday saw 600,000 people following across all platforms. "Fonda doesn’t have the power to single-handedly lower global temperatures, but she does have the power of celebrity. With it, she can draw attention to the cause and help to build a nonviolent army that may someday be big enough and loud enough to compel the government to take action." A committed activist for most of her adult life, Fonda vocally opposed the Vietnam War and the Iraq War, supported the civil rights and feminist movements and fought for Native American land rights.
September 4, 2020: There are a growing number of corporations who have decided to, at last, embrace virtual volunteering, as press releases touting newly-launched VV programs on PR Wire attest. Among the many are virtual volunteering activities by Goldman Sachs through it's CSR initiative, Community TeamWorks (CTW).
August 26, 2020: Dan Bassill of the Tutor/Mentor Connection presents a narrative that shows how onilne volunteers, including students, can and are helping this nonprofit to collect and maintain information that others can use to help youth in every poverty area of the Chicago region, and a graphic that visualizes what the nonprofit has been trying to do for the past 25 years.
August 11, 2020 Community Tech Network is a nonprofit that works throughout the San Francisco Bay Area (California) and Austin, Texas to increase the digital literacy of seniors / the elderly. Since its partner sites are closed because of the pandemic, this nonprofit has rapidly transitioned to virtually instructing seniors while they remain in the safety and comfort of their own home. CTN's Home Connect program works through the San Francisco Department of Disability and Aging Services and CTN's senior center and housing partners to identify people in need. CTN employees get senior clients set-up with Internet, ship them a pre-configured Android tablet and provide 5 hours of remote training. Afterward, employees hand-off the senior learner to a volunteer Digital Coach continues to provide remote training following the guidance of CTN's Learning Pathways. Here is a profile of one of these digital volunteers, Donald Michida.
August 10, 2020 online volunteers complete ‘Letters to Lincoln’ transcription project. "The volunteers … take this incredibly seriously.” After two years, online volunteers have completed the USA Library of Congress’s massive ‘Letters to Lincoln’ transcription project. Here's the story in the Washington Post. Here's the results of this work by online volunteers. Here's how you can volunteer with the LOC on similar historical transcription projects.
July 2, 2020 We Charity Canada causes controversy per 450 virtual volunteering roles at its own organization. We Charity, a Canadian-based organization, is offering 450 online student-volunteer placements - virtual volunteering - at its own organization as part of a $900-million federal grant program. Controversy has erupted because most Canadians would have assumed that a national volunteer program would focus on supporting places such as food banks and homeless shelters, and in addition to conflict questions, the situation raises concerns that it could be crowding out opportunities for other organizations in need. The Canada Student Service Grant program is also facing criticism from some in the voluntary sector who say it is blurring the lines between unpaid volunteering and paid work by offering compensation equivalent to $10 an hour, which is below the minimum wage in all provinces.
July 1, 2020 Using Whats App or Similar Direct Messaging Apps in Volunteer Support & Engagement. WhatsApp is both the direct messaging and the social media tool of choice in many countries and, even though it hasn't really caught on in the USA, it's worth talking about, for reasons this new resource explores. Includes examples of how various NGOs outside the USA have used WhatsApp to organize and support volunteers.
July 1, 2020 What does Bermuda mean to me? from The Royal Gazette (Bermuda's only daily newspaper): Another example of how virtual volunteering can be a very human, personal experience: an essay from a volunteer about how transcribing historical documents is bringing a person closer to a land they deeply love.
June 26, 2020 Junior Achievement is offering more virtual volunteering opportunities. There were already some JA chapters that had roles and activities for online volunteers, but there's been an increase in virtual volunteering opportunities at JA chapters since the pandemic started. Here's an example out of Massachusetts.
June 18, 2020 Various corporations have moved their traditional employee volunteering to support causes and communities online. For instance, over the last few months, Dropbox employees have moved online in virtual volunteering projects to support various communities and causes, such as career exploration videos, virtual read alouds and panels, recruiting efforts, and helping small businesses and nonprofits navigate new challenges. This DropBox blog details the activities undertaken and the schools and nonprofits that have benefited, including Skyline High Shool in Oakland, California and Mission High School, and Bret Harte Elementary in San Francisco, Code Nation, The Berkeley Center for Law and Business and WITNESS. ViacomCBS employees around the world are sharing their talents as volunteers as part of the company’s reimagined Virtual Community Day, engage in a number of virtual volunteering activities, including mentoring students with America on Tech, hosting social issues discussions with the ACLU, and leading virtual learning hours with Breakthrough New York. Note that, in many of these cases, corporations are pivoting to virtual volunteering with nonprofits they already have partnered with in traditional onsite volunteering activities. IBM India, Punjab-based Lovely Professional University, Deloitte India and other companies in India have also launched or expanded employee volunteering online in support of NGOs in India.
June 15, 2020 Jobberman is based in Nigeria and is the largest recruitment platform in sub-Saharan Africa. Jobberman connects job seekers to new work. But it has found that many job seekers lack the skills, specifically soft skills, to succeed in the workplace. In an attempt to improve job seekers’ employability and ensure young people are better prepared for the workplace, the platform created Youth Engagement and Learning arm. The platform launched a free, six-week virtual soft skills training program for 18-35 year olds. Jobberman’s youth engagement team, supported by a team of 20 volunteers, delivers the training via Zoom in keeping with COVID-19 social distancing rules. The volunteers and facilitators continue to engage the participants on various Telegram channels, outside the Zoom class. Each Telegram group is hosted by members of Jobberman’s Youth engagement team who answer trainees’ questions and test the participants’ knowledge through mini exercises.
June 6, 2020: Prince William is engaged in virtual volunteering. The English prince has been volunteering at Shout 85258, which offers support via text message to people in personal crisis. Prince William said he had been answering messages after being trained by the mental health charity. Last month he told fellow volunteers in a video call: "I'm going to share a little secret with you guys, but I'm actually on the platform volunteering." Those texting the round-the-clock service would not know they are talking to a member of the Royal Family - like Shout's 2,000 volunteers, William would use a pseudonym on the platform.
8 May 2020 Inside the struggle to control Russia's digital volunteering sector. "The Russian ecosystem of volunteering and mutual assistance that has arisen around COVID-19 is characterised by a marked predominance of digital platforms with some relation to the state, and by the crowding out of independent projects." This article lists and summarizes the many, various online efforts in Russia by citizens acting on their own, semi-political groups, media outlets and the government to mobilize volunteers online to take off-line action to help vulnerable neighbors struggling because of the global pandemic. Mentions widespread use of Telegram in some efforts.
7 May 2020. Celebrities volunteer online to help with Shakespeare homework. School children struggling to understand Shakespeare during the lockdown got tips and insights from leading actors that have performed in his plays. David Tennant, Sir Patrick Stewart and Tamsin Greig are among the big names that joined the Homework Help initiative being run by the Royal Shakespeare Company. Students with questions emailed them to a special email address or shared them using the hashtag #RSCHomeworkHelp on Twitter or Instagram by a certain date and answers were released from in the form of videos and recorded messages from actors.
1 May, 2020: CASA for Travis County adapts to virtual volunteering. Bryan Smith is a volunteer with CASA (court-appointed special advocates) for Travis County. For the past two years, he's been visiting the teenager he advocates for on a regular basis. But because of the pandemic and concerns of safety, he and the teen he helps cannot get together face-to-face in-person. As this article notes, the key to getting any child to open up is simply spending time with them, doing the things they like to do. Smith says those in-person visits are crucial when it comes to collecting information about the child's safety. "We would go to lunch together, we would go hang out together, and so he's really missing that," Smith added. Now, they are talking on the phone almost every-other night. Smith is also getting creative when communicating with the kids involved in his two short-term cases, who are both younger. The article says he's been learning as he goes, navigating the challenges of reading a book over FaceTime, while figuring out tricks with technology to make the experience more fluid. His repertoire now also includes virtual tic-tac-toe and performing magic tricks. "Some stage theatrical stuff kind of helps, I think, bring them out of their shell," he said. CEO of CASA for Travis County, Laura Wolf, says about one of Bryan Smith's charges, "She knows, Thursdays at 10 a.m., she's going to see Mr. Bryan on the screen. The routine of showing up when you say you're going to be there is really important." It's not just the visits that have gone virtual, but also the court hearings. All legal correspondence on these cases is now happening over Zoom or through email. As of the time of this article's publication, CASA in Austin volunteer training is 100 percent online.
May 2020: Virtual Volunteering for Teens at Piscataway Public Library (New Jersey). The public library in Piscataway, New Jersey, has converted its entire teen volunteering program online. It's a great model for other libraries looking to do something similar: Due to the ongoing pandemic, all of our volunteer opportunities for teens have gone virtual. Join us on Facebook Live to learn about the exciting virtual volunteer opportunities available this summer. Learn new skills, earn community service hours, and make a positive difference in your community. Register for and participate in virtual volunteer projects from the comfort of your own home!... Volunteer opportunities are divided into two categories: opportunities that require working with library patrons/peers and opportunities that are completed individually. Opportunities: Book Club Leader, Reading Buddies, Talk It Out, Tech Support, Teen Advisory Board, Virtual Program Assistant, Book & Movie Reviews, Skills Tutorial. To log completed volunteer hours, teens use the Teen Volunteer Hour Log form. Any volunteer hours earned must be submitted via this form. Some opportunities require that a volunteer have a library card. Some require volunteers attend training sessions. Some require a basic understanding of Zoom, Hoopla Digital or Google Meet, or a strong willingness to learn. Just one requires the volunteer already have an understanding of the library's electronic resources (eLibraryNJ, hoopla digital, RB Digital, etc.). More information about these opportunities and how to sign up.
May 2020: Story from CARE International. In March 2020, a report said that that 50% of what Ghanaians know about the coronavirus is misinformation. Amid the COVID-19 outbreak and the proliferation of misinformation, a network of online volunteers emerged in Ghana to translate health messages into local languages so residents can access accurate information. Elisabeth Efua lead efforts, collaborating with Farmerline, a company based in Ghana that uses technology to support farmers and was also looking to translate health messages. Elisabeth, an artist and performer, used information from the World Health Organization (WHO) to write scripts about hand washing, COVID-19 symptoms, and common terms associated with the virus such as social distancing and flattening the curve. She put out a call on social media and dozens of people responded, wanting to help translate. Within 48 hours, she’d received translations in 15 languages including Twi, Ga, Ewe, and Hausa. The health messages are recorded as voice notes on WhatsApp, which volunteers have been disseminating and asking recipients to forward to others who speak the language, akin to chain mail.
17 May 2020 Per many volunteering abroad programs being postponed because of the pandemic, Jayne has created a list of Ideas for High Impact Virtual Volunteering Activities, for people seeking ideas for an online project that will mobilize online volunteers in activities that lead to a sustainable, lasting benefit to a community or cause, particularly for a community or audience that is at-risk or under-served. These ideas absolutely can be adapted for remote volunteering within the same country where the online volunteers live as well - "remote" could mean across town rather than around the world.
14 March 2020 How a face-to-face mentoring program, StreetWise Partners in New York City, is transitioning to virtual volunteering during the Covid-19 pandemic. Case study by Gallup, one of the program's funders. StreetWise provides young adults and skilled immigrants who are unemployed or working in low-wage, low-growth jobs with critical mentorship to unlock careers traditionally unavailable to them. StreetWise has shifted its in-person mentorship approach to a series of virtual programs that engages volunteers and clients in one-on-one employment support and emergency needs; virtual mock interviews; and a 13-week remote workforce mentoring program.
12 May 2020 CV19: Meet The Volunteer COVID-19 Cyber Heroes Helping Healthcare Fight The Hackers. Cybercriminals are exploiting the fear and confusion that the COVID-19 pandemic has brought with it. Healthcare workers are being targeted by a dangerous new Windows ransomware campaign. One newly formed group of information security professionals, including company CISOs, penetration testers, security researchers, and more, have vowed to do all they can to help provide cybersecurity support to healthcare services across the U.K. and Europe. Cyber Volunteers 19 (CV19) was started after a discussion between three prominent members of the information security community regarding what they could do to help during the coronavirus crisis.
1 May 2020, Tokyo, Japan: Keepers at Toyko's Sumida Aquarium, which has been closed since 1 March due to the coronavirus pandemic, are worrying about their garden eels. The sensitive little creatures had become used to seeing hundreds of faces peering into their tanks. Now the aquarium is deserted the eels have started to dive into the sand whenever their keepers walk past. This makes it hard to check they're healthy. The aquarium says the eels are "forgetting about humans." So the aquarium staff asked for online volunteers to call in for a sub-aqua Facetime video chat and remind the eels that humans are friendly. It's placing five tablets facing towards the tank in a "face-showing festival" scheduled for 3 to 5 May. "Could you show your face to our garden eels from your home?"
April 2020: In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, virtual volunteering is suddenly a very hot topic. In response:
Jayne has prepared a new resource to help nonprofits, charities, government programs and other that involve volunteers to quickly, immediately, launch online roles and task for their volunteers, so they can continue to be engaged and so the organization can continue to meet its mission and, perhaps, even reach more people with their services.
Per several new virtual volunteering initiatives being launched without any consideration for safety of volunteers and clients, this blog about safety in virtual volunteering is being re-circulated and there is a new 5 minute YouTube video about safety in virtual volunteering.
Per some push back about the rush to virtual volunteering, with fears expressed that it's impersonal, Jayne prepared a video about the very personal nature of virtual volunteering and another short YouTube video explaining why its inappropriate to call virtual volunteering new.
Long before COVID19, Jayne maintained the longest list ANYWHERE of where and how to find virtual volunteering opportunities - a resource that targets volunteers, who want to keep helping but aren't finding enough online volunteering to keep them engaged.
2 January 2020, Smithsonian Magazine: A computer vision specialist at the University of Tokyo is leading a team of 20 plus onsite and online volunteers in a campaign to resurrect Shuri Castle in Japan in digital form. The UNESCO World Heritage Site was destroyed by fire in October 2019, leaving the residents of Okinawa heart-broken. While government officials have promised to do everything necessary to restore the castle to its former glory, the volunteers hope that the digital reconstruction, called Our Shurijo, will keep the site alive in the interim. So far, the group has digitally reproduced the main hall, the crown display and the throne room. To continue their work, they need more volunteers with photographs of the structure before the fire - they ultimately need one million photos capturing the castle from all sides. Since Our Shurijo's launch on November 9, 2,836 people - online volunteers - have submitted more than 30,000. The group plans on sharing updated submission statistics on Twitter every Monday. Kawakami and her colleagues released the first model of the main hall on Twitter on December 24.
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Want to know more about using the Internet to engage and support volunteers? See:
The
Last Virtual
Volunteering Guidebook
by Jayne Cravens and Susan J. Ellis
The most comprehensive guide
available on virtual volunteering, including online mentoring,
micro-volunteeirng, virtual teams, high-responsibility roles,
crowd sourcing to benefit nonprofits and other mission-based
organizations, and much more.
Published January 2014, based on
more than 30 years of research. Available as both a print
book and an ebook.
