Could you provide invaluable support by ensuring prisoners’ human rights are upheld and that life in prison contributes to their rehabilitation, resulting in a safer Scotland? If yes, you may be the person who can make a unique contribution to improving Scotland’s prisons, listening to and supporting prisoners and positively impacting on their lives in your local community. We are currently recruiting Independent Prison Monitors (IPMs), a voluntary role that can be challenging and rewarding. As well as the opportunity to participate in one of the most unusual and valuable types of voluntary work, you will have the opportunity to meet and work with many people from diverse backgrounds and walks of life. We encourage diversity and particularly welcome applications from groups currently under-represented in the IPM Team. If you are interested please visit our website for more information.www.prisonsinspectoratescotland.gov.uk

Rape Crisis Grampian is a fully inclusive service which provides free, confidential support to survivors of rape and sexual violence aged of 13 years and over. To enable us to provide a consistent service, Survivors are supported by Volunteer Support Workers. We currently have a pool of eleven Volunteers who offer face to face, email or telephone support. Support Volunteers undertake a comprehensive selection and training process and will be registered with the PVG – Protection of Vulnerable Groups scheme. We are looking for individuals who are: *Empathetic, non-judgemental and good listeners *Able to commit to volunteering for at least 12 months and a minimum of three hours per week *Able to maintain confidentiality and anonymity *Open to gaining an understanding about rape and sexual violence and its impacts on individuals. Excellent training and support is provided to all volunteers. Including sixty hours of training. The training is comprehensive and ensures all Volunteers are equipped with the skills necessary to support Survivors. Debriefing is provided after each support session and volunteers are further supported via quarterly group Supervision as an additional means of support. If you would like more information or to apply please contact our Volunteer Coordinator on: 01224 590932 or email: volunteercoordinator@rapecrisisgrampian.co.uk

Help People at Difficult Times Listening volunteers are there for anyone who needs someone, and provide confidential emotional support for people who are experiencing feelings of distress or despair, including those which may lead to suicide. Every seven seconds someone contacts us. Every seven seconds we can help someone turn their life around. As a listening volunteer you get the chance to make a real difference to someone’s future. You can offer support on the phone, email or text. Volunteers typically volunteer a minimum of a 4 hour duty per week, as well as a 4 hour night duty at monthly intervals. There are no qualifications required and you’ll receive full training to prepare you for the kinds of conversations you’ll have. And when you start out, you’ll have a mentor with you, to give you confidence you’re doing the right thing. You can also apply to help with administration or other non-listening support. Let us know how you would like to help.

Shetland Bereavement Support Service (SBSS) are looking to recruit volunteer Support Workers. A Support Worker will provide one to one counselling to anyone struggling to cope following a bereavement.

Place2Be works with over 280 primary and secondary schools, reaching a school population of more than 116,000 children. As a volunteer counsellor you will work one to one in a therapeutic capacity with up to 3 children per week. The commitment is for one day per week, for three school terms, from 8.30am to 4.30pm to include therapy sessions and supervision of clinical work. There may also be opportunities to get involved with group work alongside the School Project Manager.

We have just moved into new premises and following a refurbishment we are opening our doors very soon. Due to the increase in days we are open, we need more volunteers to support the centre. CLAN Cancer Support is a well-established, local charity providing emotional and practical support to people affected by cancer, their family, carers and friends. Services are freely offered to all from pre-diagnosis and diagnosis through to treatment and beyond at our support and wellbeing centres located across the north-east Scotland, Moray, Orkney and Shetland. Our aim is to help people live with and beyond their or their loved ones cancer diagnosis and improve the quality of life for all those who turn to us for help and support. The role of Support Volunteer at CLAN is to offer clients affected by a cancer diagnosis an opportunity to talk with someone who can listen and provide emotional support and help to promote and raise awareness of our services. Our Support Volunteers don’t have to be experts as they will be trained in the skills that will enable them to provide the right level of emotional support to all our clients. Throughout their time volunteering with us at CLAN they will have access to ongoing support and further training. As you will appreciate the nature of our work means we deal with vulnerable members of the public and therefore we ask for a character reference in respect of those who wish to volunteer. We also require a Disclosure Scotland check to completed. Clan will meet the cost of this. If anyone is interested in the role, please get in touch with Helen Hasnip or Christine Roper at Banchory@clancancersupport.org or ringing 01330 538967 (leave a message)

Could you be there for children? At Childline, our free counselling service for children, a child contacts us every 25 seconds. And thanks to our dedicated volunteers, who do a shift each week, we can offer support when it’s needed most. To make sure it stays that way, we’re looking for more brilliant people who want to make a difference. After you get trained and set up in your local base, you’ll be helping children and young people who need someone to talk to. Listening to them at first and then offering support, information, or practical advice. Interested? Then get ready to take a life-changing step forward – for you and for children. For further details regarding this and other volunteer opportunities at our Aberdeen base or to apply to be a volunteer please: apply online via: https://www.nspcc.org.uk/what-you-can-do/volunteering-nspcc-childline or email: kerri.stewart@nspcc.org.uk / phone:01224 973030.

Childline is a vital service available 365 days a year to support children and young people, whatever their worry or concern. A ChildLine counsellor provides an essential service to children and young people who contact the helpline by telephone or via the ChildLine website. As a trained volunteer, Childline Volunteer Counsellors are able to respond to children and young people in a variety of ways that meet their needs at the time they contact. Full training is provided and ChildLine Supervisors always work alongside counselling volunteers giving support, advice and any direction required. A great opportunity to help make a real difference for the lives of children. For further details regarding this and other volunteer opportunities at our Aberdeen base or to apply to be a volunteer please: apply online via: https://www.nspcc.org.uk/what-you-can-do/volunteering-nspcc-childline or email: kerri.stewart@nspcc.org.uk / phone:01224 973030.

Cruse Scotland provides a range of specialist support to bereaved people across Scotland. Our counselling and listening volunteer team have a wide range of skills and expertise working with people to help them overcome obstacles to wellbeing and find ways forward through the challenges that life can bring when dealing with a bereavement. Like so many support organisations, we are seeing an increasing demand of our services and we are looking for qualified counsellors to join our therapeutic team. This is a unique opportunity to provide specialist intervention to support people to gain an insight and understanding into their grief. We work within a time limited model of support and ask that all volunteers work with a minimum of two clients at any given time We are looking for trained counsellors who are supportive and non-judgemental, proactive, motivated, and open to change and demonstrate an understanding of the importance and scope of confidentiality. Excellent interpersonal and communication skills are also essential. You must be a registered member of COSCA or the BACP and hold a recognised Diploma in Counselling. We provide individual clinical supervision, with optional group supervision, frequent and varied CPD opportunities and management and administrative support from our local client teams. Due to the pandemic, we are currently delivering our services by telephone and online but will begin to offer to face to face support again when public health advice allows. We can offer training to those who are new to phone or online counselling If you are interested in applying for this volunteer role please visit our website at Current Volunteer Opportunities : Cruse Bereavement Care (crusescotland.org.uk)

Sunflower Garden works with children and young people aged 5 to 18 based in Edinburgh who are affected by drug and/or alcohol use within their family. We understand that the support we provide needs to be specific to the needs of each child/young person and so we offer a range of tailored therapeutic support such as: Counselling (including art and play therapy), 1-to-1 therapeutic support and group work. We are looking for volunteer counsellors to join our team.