HandsOn Volunteer Programs

We are thrilled to announce our NEW! portal which is powered by HandsOn Connect! With this powerful tool, volunteers can search for local opportunities, and nonprofits can post their current needs. We want to make it easy for you to make a difference! We welcome all potential volunteers and nonprofits from Forsyth, Surry, Stokes, Yadkin, Davie and Davidson counties to take advantage of this fantastic resource. Start now, by selecting one of the links below, which will take you directly to our searchable database of volunteer opportunities:

• Volunteer Now – Search for Volunteer Opportunities
• New Nonprofits – Become a Partner To List Your Volunteer Opportunities
• Returning Nonprofits – Login & Update Profile or Opportunities
• View Participating Agencies (Please check this list *before* creating a new organizational account!)

Interested in a short-term service activity for your group? We can help! We provide three levels of service to best fit your needs:
Community Connection List–FREE!
Need something on short notice? We’ll be happy to provide you with a short list of organizations that we have found work well with groups. Arranging the details will fall to you and your team.

Custom Matchmaking–FREE for Supporting Partners!
Please e-mail us with the date, time, age range, group size and other needs of your group and we’ll be happy to share this opportunity with our entire network of more than 400 nonprofits, and have them turnaround possible project ideas custom-crafted for your group! We do need at least a two-week turnaround time for this service; however, this option can save you significant time, because you know that every organization on the list has a project that would accommodate your size and schedule, as well as any unique requests. You would then choose the ones that would be of most interest to your team and would be responsible for finalizing the logistics of the project with the nonprofit partner.

If you would like us to arrange and manage all the logistics of your service opportunity, we’ll be happy to do so on a fee-for-service, per person basis. Please check out our services for Corporations and Employee Volunteers for more details.

National Days of Service are a series of nationally-recognized and celebrated one-day service events that bring people together in their local communities, schools and neighborhoods to highlight particular needs, find new solutions, and renew our sense of commitment to community service. HandsOn was pleased to begin offering Days of Service opportunities beginning with Martin Luther King Day in January 2010.

Martin Luther King, Jr. Day of Service

In 2010, HandsOn Northwest North Carolina, in partnership with Wake Forest University, Winston-Salem State University and Salem College, planned our first-ever Read-In event to promote Dr. King’s messages of service and literacy in conjunction and co-located with one of the largest commemorative events held in our city every year: the 30th Annual Noon Hour Commemoration of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s Birthday. The 2010 MLK Day of Service Read-In was a “day on, not a day off” for more than 300 community members in Winston-Salem. The collaboration was the first of its kind in Winston-Salem and allowed parents to attend the Noon Hour Commemoration while their children attended the Read-In event. The children learned about Dr. King, performed service such as writing letters to troops, and they also received new and used donated books. Approximately 500 books were distributed to the 100 children who participated in the event. Since then, we’ve held the event on the Wake Forest University campus, and the event has grown each year. For pictures, check out our photo album on Picasa. If you would like to partner with us for the 2014 MLK Day of Service, please contact Karen Whitley.

September 11th Day of Service and Remembrance

Also in 2010, as part of our first-ever 9/11 Day of Service and Remembrance, HandsOn NWNC organized a community-wide donation drive for the troops serving in Iraq and Afganistan. Each year since then, we’ve developed projects with a variety of our partners around the community. The projects have involved hundred of volunteers through the years, and usually span the week that is inclusive of September 11th. If you’re interested in hosting a project or volunteering for the 2014 9/11 Day of Service, please contact us.

In the summer of 2010, HandsOn NWNC, together with multiple community partners, began the creation of a Neighboring volunteer collaborative, a volunteer-driven program to strengthen youth and families in the Waughtown neighborhood. Neighboring is the quitenessential model for “doing with, rather than doing for” a community, engaging residents and families who live in marginalized and low-income communities as volunteers and leaders in volunteer-directed community activities, program planning and execution, advocacy and leadership development. The collaborative seeks to model innovative volunteer programs to promote more inclusive engagement of volunteers from this community, which is traditioanlly under-engaged in civic life. The collaborative also seeks faith-based and neighborhood organizations as partners while promoting volunteering as a means for community residents to connect to economic recovery opportunities, needed services and support, and caring and nurturing social networks that promote community change.

Currently, our Neighboring work is combined with the national HandsOn Schools program, and is working to engage parents, neighbors, and volunteer leaders as we all work to improve abseetism rates and literacy amongst students who attend four after-school programs in and around the Waughtown neighborhood. If you are a citizen or organization that is currently active in neighborhood and is interested in joining the collaborative, please email Karen Whitley. We also welcome interest from volunteers outside of the neighborhood, including bilingual individuals, skills-based volunteers who have experience in education, evaluation, and youth development, as well as those willing to serve as mentors and tutors.

• Programs for Corporations & Employee Volunteering
• Training and Education