A big celebration for a big contribution
Have you got the invites out and the bunting up? With 1 June fast approaching, make sure you are ready to celebrate this Volunteers’ Week!
Here is our checklist to get you started:
- Download your free resource pack, which has everything you need to make your celebrations a success. Sign up the Volunteers’ Week website to receive your pack.
- Post your event on the Volunteers’ Week map.
- Share your plans on social media using #VolunteersWeek and follow @NCVOvolunteers.
Young people leading the way
Get your hands on a new resource pack for young people by signing up to the Volunteers’ Week website. This year, we’ve teamed up with the #iwill campaign, to produce these new resources to support young people to get involved with Volunteers’ Week.
Plus, join in with #iwill’s Share Your Pledge Day on 8 June, to celebrate the achievements made by the 500+ partners who have pledged to enable youth social action.
Breaking news
If you want to tell journalists about your volunteers’ invaluable work, get involved with Constructive Voices.
As covered in the Guardian, we believe that charities have positive stories to tell and innovative, practical solutions to offer – but too often, these are under the radar. NCVO’s new project, Constructive Voices, wants to help you and your volunteers be heard. To do this, Constructive Voices will:
- create a hub for positive case studies
- link up journalists with voluntary sector organsiations and volunteers
- encourage more constructive news articles.
Find out how you can get involved with Constructive Voices.
Does volunteering make an impact?
We asked whether volunteering makes an impact and if so, how to measure it, at the latest National Volunteering Forum on 5 May.
Catch up with the discussion with:
- Karl’s blog post, which asks whether volunteering is time well spent
- VM Movement’s Thoughtful Thursdays discussion.
If you want to know more about how to assess the impact of your volunteers – and how to use this evidence to unlock more support and resources in your organisation, take a look at our upcoming training:
- Assessing the impact of your volunteers, 11 July
- Influencing for volunteer managers, 14 June
Take a look at our other training opportunities, including:
- Safeguarding for volunteer managers, 29 June
Why we’re calling to keep Parkrun free
Volunteering is good for you and so is a walk or run in the park. Combine the two and you’re really onto something. Parkrun does just this, yet Stoke Gifford Parish Council voted to impose a charge on the Little Stoke parkrun. Following this decision, we wrote to the council with the Sport and Recreation Alliance and Join In to ask them to reconsider their decision.
You can read why we’re calling to keep Parkrun free on the blog.
Volunteering in health and social care should be valued, improved and promoted
Charities should be deeply involved at every level of the health and social care system
A new government-backed report recommends that volunteering is valued, improved and promoted in health and social care.
Focused on the voluntary sector’s involvement in statutory health and social care, this report urges local hospitals, clinical commissioning groups and councils to do more to involve the voluntary sector in the design and delivery of services of all kinds.
As Chair of the VCSE Review, Alex Fox notes, at its best the voluntary sector draws upon whole communities, including through volunteering and social action.
Can Investing in Volunteers help to improve health outcomes?
On the Ideas to Impact blog, Bec Nixon concludes just that. Our quality mark for volunteering, Investing in Volunteers (IiV), can help get the best out of volunteers, ultimately maximising positive outcomes for healthcare services.
Book now for this free event if you work in health and social care and want to find out how strategic management and the IiV quality mark can help ensure professional, innovative and impactful volunteer programmes.
Congratulations achievers!
Congratulations to our new IiV achievers! A total of 21 organisations across the UK were newly accredited or successfully renewed the quality standard in April. Find out who achieved IiV last month.
If you want to:
- benchmark the quality of your volunteer management and involvement
- prove and improve the effectiveness of your work with volunteers
- enhance your organisation’s reputation
Then IiV is the quality standard for you! Learn more on the IiV website or get in touch with us at IiV@ncvo.org.uk.
Emily was NCVO’s trainee volunteering development policy officer. She is interested in policy around volunteering, particularly diversity in volunteering, employability, volunteering in public services, and employer supported volunteering. 
