Service Project - What did you do for your project?

A.     October 26, 2011 (9:30am – 5:30pm)

Helped develop, rewrite, and organize The Night Ministry’s media book. Found new contacts in major newspapers throughout the U.S., magazines, radio stations, and television stations that focus mainly on hunger and homelessness pertaining to youth and health related organizations.

I organized welcome packets for clients and potential sponsors, cleaned up and disposed of outdated donations, and made notes of previous donations before 2005 in funding files. Lastly, I engaged in and observed conversations with staff members, calls, and walk-in donators that trickle in every few hours.

Some of the staff was extremely nice and welcoming. They work after hours and meet at certain shelters to further lend a helping hand to those in need. They ordered food for the staff and discussed leftover food being given to those in the shelter.

November 2, 2011 (8:50am – 3:30pm)

Continued to organize and find editors and writers to add to their media book from the Washington Post, The Sun Times, and the New York Times. Developed a template for their media contact binder and e-mailed it to my Night Ministry supervisor.

Re-boxed welcome bags containing items such as mugs, key chains, and pamphlets with The Night Ministry logo and explanation of their mission.

I cut and stapled thank you messages to pins for those that were willing to donate to the organizations in the month of November in preparation for mailing while discussing stories of how employees reading thank you notes from clients are the most rewarding part of their jobs and the reason why they love their career choice.

I developed binders for a potential sponsor seminar, created labels, designed cover sheets with The Night Ministry logo, and ensuring topics of their mission are properly displayed, such as important dates, introduction of board of directors, types of programs offered, etc.

I then hole punched all items that are to be placed into the bonders and organized them in the order of labeled sections and placed them into each binder.

November 12, 2011 (9:05am – 2:35pm)

Took part in volunteer training that began with introductions and why each of us chose to be there. We had the opportunity to get to know fellow volunteers, along with gaining an insight of where each of us are from and where we grew up.

We then watched a video on The Night Ministry and gained an idea of the organizations mission and funding, along with what programs they have to offer. We then broke up into groups and discussed our own cultures and our personal experiences with other cultures throughout our lifetime. I learned that even though we grew up in different neighborhoods and socialized in different cultures, we all had the desire to be part of the greater good and take part in offering our assistance to those in need in our community.

We were then given an assignment to come up with numerous reasons we feel homeless individuals are privileged and how they are underprivileged. We then listened to a presentation from a longtime volunteer and a representative named Gail Bernoff re-explaining the types of assistance The Night Ministry offers with the purpose of deciding which program we may choose to provide our fulltime assistance.

Lastly, they divided us into groups by our program choice and spoke to professionals, delivering a deeper understanding of the area we chose. They handed out information packets with pamphlets and fliers welcoming us to the agency and provided us with further details of what we must do in order to complete our background check to become a fulltime volunteer.

B.     Kirstin Hill and Wiktoria Bosco attended this site as well, however, I only was able to work a few hours with Wiktoria on October 26, 2011 from about 3:30 to 5:30 pm. I cleaned up and organized the contribution files while she shredded and disposed of outdated donations that piled up throughout the day. Lastly, we both conversed with staff members and observed conversations with calls and walk-in donators.