► Volunteering News

Liverpool Guild of Students has completed the second stage of the Investing in Volunteers award

LGoS has now completed the second stage of the Investing in Volunteers award process, demonstrating it's committment to volunteering. The award has several benefits including improving the effectiveness of our work with volunteers in a structured way, compare our volunteer practices against a recognised standard and encourage more people to volunteer.

There are six stages to the process and the awards take twelve months on average to complete. For more information about Investing in Volunteers, visit here.

 Fall in volunteering numbers 'caused by lack of opportunities'
 By Sophie Hudson, Third Sector Online, 4 February 2011

Volunteering England says charities report an increase in people wanting to volunteer but unable to find suitable roles
A lack of suitable volunteering opportunities is the main reason why the proportion of people who volunteer has been falling, according to Volunteering England. In an interview with Third Sector, Rob Jackson, the charity’s director of development and innovation, said it had seen a huge increase recently in the number of people who wanted to volunteer.

"This shows a lack of volunteering opportunities that people want to do," he said. "For example, the opportunities might not be flexible enough."

He said this would be a major theme in Volunteering England’s volunteer management conference in March.
He said the question of employment rights for volunteers was not a main cause of the drop in volunteering. Official figures recently showed a decline in the proportion of people who volunteer.

Patrick Daniels, one of the directors of the Association of Volunteer Managers, said creating the right opportunities was about balancing the needs of the volunteers and the organisation.

"There has generally never been a lack of volunteers, but good quality opportunities do cost money," he said.

Daniels said the government should improve the situation by investing in volunteering infrastructure and raising awareness among other funders, so they understood that managing and recruiting volunteers effectively cost money.

Rebekah Turner, volunteer and fundraising coordinator for the Liverpool Guild of Students, which is part of Volunteering Liverpool, said charities sometimes struggled to raise awareness of the opportunities they had to offer.She said Volunteering Liverpool recently launched a website that helped to match volunteers and opportunities. She said the site had more than 1,250 volunteers but only about 250 opportunities. "Charities are not reaching out enough at the moment and sometimes they don’t know how to," she said. "They should be using the internet more than they are. We’re trying to get the message out there."

2011 Europeon Year of Volunteering

The European Commission has decided to propose that 2011 be designated the "European Year of Volunteering". The Council is expected to endorse this decision, after the European Parliament has been consulted, by the beginning of next year.

Read the full story here

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The Guild

Hello and welcome to Liverpool Guild of Students!

As a University of Liverpool student, you are automatically one of over 17000 members of the Guild. We are run by 4 elected students, who are supported by staff and volunteers.

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