Volunteer
The Highmark Caring Place is a volunteer based program. Our volunteers are the HEART of our program. The qualities that lead people to volunteer in the first place— being compassionate, empathetic, accepting, flexible, dedicated and committed—are the same qualities that help them to support grieving children and families.
The Highmark Caring Place is a place of caring because of the volunteers who devote themselves to the children and families.
Volunteer Opportunities:
Caring Place volunteers come from all walks of life. All are motivated by the desire to give back to their communities and to make a difference, especially with children. Volunteering requires no prior training or background. All Caring Place volunteers are trained by Caring Place staff to acquire the skills to fulfill the role they choose. Read what some of our volunteers have said about volunteering at the Caring Place.
There are many ways to give your time as a volunteer at the Caring Place:
Peer Support Group Facilitator: Facilitate group activities and discussions with children and and/or adults. Support group facilitators attend a 26 hour training program prior to volunteering to prepare them to work with grieving children and families in a support group format
Family Greeter: Welcome families as they enter the Caring Place and help them to feel comfortable as they arrive
Food Server: Attend to the needs of the families during the dinner hour
Special Projects: Lend a hand stuffing envelopes, assembling packets of information for outreach events, organizing group room supplies, and/or assisting at fundraisers and various Caring Place Ceremonies and special events.
Quilters: Help assemble quilt squares made by Caring Place families into Memorial Quilts to be displayed at the Caring Place.
More than 700 volunteers donated more than 13,000 hours of their time to the lives of grieving children and families over the past year.
Based on the per-hour estimate of the value of volunteer time by Independent Sector: A Coalition of Leading Nonprofits, Foundations, And Corporations, the total dollar value for one year of time donated to the Highmark Caring Place by its hundreds of volunteers is more than $223,000.
