SUMMARY
- According to an article from SwimSwam, there has been a “downward trend” in volunteerism in schools over the last decade—a trend that’s been noticed across the entire United States. This is seen in sports, music, PTAs, class trips and just about any other type of activity that’s traditionally relied on parent volunteers for assistance.
- Part of the problem is that parents are dealing with volunteer burnout. They’re asked to take on too many responsibilities for their kids’ activities. With fewer stay-at-home parents than ever before, there are fewer parents who have the hours in a given day, week or month needed to be able to chip in the volunteer hours they would have been able to in years past.
- Still, there are strategies for schools to attract volunteers. Personal requests can encourage more volunteerism. Narrowing the focus of what the volunteer will be doing can also help to decrease burnout, as the parent will not feel as though they have to shoulder an immense level of responsibility for a certain task. Finally, providing plenty of recognition and appreciation can help encourage parents to come back over and over again to volunteer.
INSIGHT
While it has been harder these days to attract and retain volunteers, that does not mean there are not parents who are willing to come in and volunteer their time and skills. It simply takes proper coordination and management of parent volunteers to help them feel as though their time is valued and appreciated, and that they’re actually contributing something substantial to the school. Reducing volunteer burnout will go a long way toward keeping volunteers happy and encouraging more to come in and participate.
Flex Academies regularly works with schools and school districts to beef up their bases of volunteers and to figure out better ways of volunteer management to keep all parent volunteers happy and focused.
“Combating Volunteer Burnout With Flex Academies” – https://flexacademies.com/2019/02/07/combating-volunteer-burnout-flex-academies/
