Large Community Giveback Effort - Part One

In 2007, I was tapped to organize the North American Youth Congress Community Giveback Effort for over 1,000 individuals in Charlotte, North Carolina.

Whoa! What a HUGE effort!

The difference that was made as a result of the organization of this event, was well worth all the effort I put into planning it.

I am going to attempt to show you how you too can organize a giveback opportunity of this magnitude relatively seamlessly.

This will be a series of blogs - so check back often for... the rest of the story.

1. Determine the area in which you wish to make a difference.

2. Contact the local non-profits in that area to determine the need. Do not waste your time talking to part-time staff members or volunteers at these organizations. Go right to the top - the Executive Director or President/CEO will know more about the need and can make the final call as to how many volunteers they could use and what work will need to be accomplished while your group is there.

3. Remember, DETAILS, DETAILS, DETAILS - you must have them ALL before organizing the sign-up process for your volunteers.

4. We created a website so that individuals who came to this event from all around North America could get involved.

5. We set a deadline on registration.

6. We encouraged all attendees to participate, free of charge.

7. We had over 15,000 students and adult volunteers in attendance at NAYC in Charlotte and close to 1,500 served during our giveback opportunity called Project 22:39. (Project 22:39 was named with Matthew 22:39 in mind, "Love your neighbor as yourself.")

8. Define your goals so that everyone can take part in the "win".

9. Our goal was to provide giveback opportunities in Charlotte, NC for 2-3 hours on one day during a huge youth conference. Believe it or not, it was doable. (even when I thought it wasn't.)

10. I found that Parks and Recs were able to fill close to 1,000 volunteer positions during our Project 22:39 efforts. I recommend working with Parks and Recs for any type of giveback opportunity where you expect a large number of individuals to participate.

11. I had 5 students at the local homeless shelter, 20 volunteers at a Crisis Control Minisries Store, 25 individuals at the local Food Bank - but when you are talking numbers of partipants over 1,000 - you need a larger opportunity like parks and recs to put your volunteers to work!

I will write more on this later. Stay tuned...