Volunteers
Volunteers play an essential role in delivering senior nutrition services — without them, many local service providers would not be able to provide support to older adults effectively. Learning to recruit, engage, and maintain strong relationships with volunteers will help your program thrive.
Guides
- Tips for Working With Students — Effective approaches for working with students
(Center Excellence in Public Health and the Center for Excellence in Aging Health
at the University of New England) - Project HELLO — Engagement of older adults in Rhode Island through a multiphase
effort with volunteers (Nutrition and Aging Resource Center) - What Works: Tailored Meals and Volunteers, A New Jersey Meals on Wheels Shares Its Secrets —
Interview with Meals on Wheels of Mercer County (Nutrition and Aging Resource Center) - Volunteer Utilization — Tips on nontraditional roles for volunteers (Nutrition and Aging Resource Center, 2023)
- Tips for Recruiting and Working With Volunteers — Overview to recruit, build, and maintain a strong working relationship with volunteers (Nutrition and Aging Resource Center, 2021)
- Project Ideas for Volunteer Dietetic Interns, Nutrition Students, and Professionals— Activity designed to support nutrition programs and volunteers (Nutrition and Aging Resource Center, 2023)
Presentations
- Recipe for Success: Volunteers (YouTube)— Bite-sized video with tips on recruiting, engaging, and retaining (Nutrition and Aging Resource Center, 2024)
- Thinking Outside the Box Video Series — ACL video series on volunteers in the aging services network
- Fireside Chat With the New York City Department for the Aging (YouTube)— Thirty-minute video (2023)
- Fireside Chat With SDSU Cooperative Extension (YouTube)— Thirty-minute video (2023)
- Senior Center Round Table – Celebrating Volunteers!— One-hour event featuring perspectives on volunteerism in senior centers, free registration required to view the video (National Council on Aging, 2022)
Reports
- Volunteerism Study — Study estimating the economic value of volunteers, highlighting key national and local findings (ACL, 2021)
- Economic Value of Volunteers — Key results (ACL, 2021)
- Effective Volunteer Practices — Examples (ACL, 2021)
- Study Briefing— Fifty-minute video presentation (ACL, 2021)
- Volunteer Stories Brief — Insights (ACL, 2021)
Tools and Toolkits
- Effective Elements Library— Collection of approaches that will enable organizations to create impactful volunteer-based models (Community Care Corps)
- Give 5 Program— Initiative connecting retired or nearly retired older adults with nonprofit organizations (Give 5)