By: Angela Van Asten, ADRC Staff
In my humble opinion, our volunteers are the best. If you know anything about us or had the opportunity to interact with an ADRC volunteer, then you know what I’m talking about. And if you are an ADRC volunteer and you’re reading this, THANK YOU! I don’t think we can say that enough – THANK YOU!
So much of what we do here is made possible by our volunteers:
- Home delivered meals are primarily packaged and delivered by volunteers. We’re talking 500+ meals five days a week. That alone is a huge amount of work that we couldn’t do alone. It’s not just the act of packaging and delivering the meals, we receive calls on a weekly basis from our meal recipients saying how wonderful and kind their meal delivery drivers are.
- Grounded Café volunteers help by making delicious soups and drinks, prepping food, serving scrumptious bakery items, and working the cash register. They also help to mentor and teach our trainees.
- If you’ve ever joined us for lunch as part of ADRC’s Community CafĂ© for those 60 years of age and older, you’ve likely encountered the “dynamic trio.” They greet you with a smile and probably a joke or two. Two of those three helping to serve the meals are volunteers!
- We have volunteers trained to be class leaders for some of our health and wellness education workshops and classes, technology tutors, and in-home fall safety assessors. Volunteers also run many of our weekly activities, including rock painting, tatting, yoga, and crochet.
- Administrative volunteers help at our front desk greeting customers, answering phones, and working on various projects, including outreach initiatives.
- Our ADRC magazine is delivered to organizations and businesses throughout the community by dedicated volunteers.
- We’re incredibly fortunate to have extremely knowledgeable volunteers that conduct some of our Medicare classes and events as well as volunteer attorneys that provide legal counseling.
- Every individual on our Board of Directors is a volunteer. They provide ADRC staff with guidance and support while working to adhere to our mission, vision, and values.
As you can see, we are so very lucky and honored to have these wonderful people on our team. That’s why when we tell our volunteers “THANK YOU!” it just doesn’t seem like enough to express our gratitude!
