As a co-founder of Three for Me, I wanted to share some of our thoughts, experiences and remarks from parents around the country about volunteers. We are two moms that volunteer; a lot! We are into everything. Myself and the gal that started Three for Me are the types of people that never say "no". We volunteer because it benefits our children and all children at our school. For many parents, that alone, is enough to get involved, but the reality is that far too many parents don't volunteer because of one of many reasons they can list off. The unreachables seem to be the majority of dads. So, we started Three for Me to reach out to that untapped group of parents which, we hoped to intrigue with a simple promise; three hours of volunteerism for the entire school year.
But, I say this so that you all realize that we are in the trenches with you every day; coordinating help, planning events and program, raising funds, etc., to benefit our school and the children.
Coordinating volunteers is simple if you have a plan in place. You don't have to start from scratch or change anything about your committees or how they operate when you start Three for Me. Basically, you will add a committee team that will help plug volunteers into place. This team will contact EVERY volunteer by phone or email and get them plugged-in to an activity or event. Whether it's at school, in the evening, from home, etc. Then they will hand off the information to the chairperson of that committee. The chairperson then takes over. Three for Me, reaches out to parents, many who have never volunteered before and gives them a simple and non-threatening goal to get involved in their child's educational experience.
Parents see the light at the end of the tunnel with the three hour commitment. Most parents volunteer four times as much on average. You'll also increase the number of volunteers to produce successful events.
A key to success with any parent group is to coordinate your volunteers effectively and consistently. By having a volunteer coordinator and a team, you have structure and "go to" people. The sad and common remark that I have heard from parents around the country is, "I signed up and no one ever called." Or, "I want to volunteer, but don't know how to get involved."
Some schools are having a lot of success by making their room parent a person on the Volunteer Coord. Team. Then, that room parent oversees, contacts, and helps get those parents in that specific classroom get plugged-in to volunteering. Always remembering to reach out to moms and dads and grandparents and uncles and older siblings, etc. That works well in the elementary schools.
At the middle school, you need a team of people on the vol. coord committee to share in the workload to contact volunteers. It helps to put a team together at each grade level in the middle school. Those parents know each other and will share common interests about the school.
At the High School, you break it down by sports, music, art, technology, etc. Parents are more drawn to volunteer when their child is involved in the activity.
Overall, Three for Me works will help to reach out to new parents, parents that have not volunteered and to many important family members of the child. It makes parent group leaders re-think how they coordinate volunteers. The PTO Software to track volunteers looks awesome. This is definitely a piece of software that you should look into. Good luck and feel free to check out our site or email us anytime. Everything is free. We will even customize a promise card and certificate template with your school's name and then you can make copies as needed.
www.three4me.com.
