If you like to keep active and stay in shape, volunteering in one of our local furniture store warehouses could be the answer you’re looking for. We need helpful and active people to help keep our stock moving from the van to warehouse and onto the store and from store back to the van for delivery! This role involves keeping active but it’s not just moving furniture. There are other opportunities to help our warehouse team such as booking in and checking over stock for sale, putting together our flat packed furniture and testing electrical items. For more information please contact Ian Marlow, Volunteer Manager at email: marlowi@bhf.org.uk or tel.: 07384 256675.

Volunteering Matters Overview At Volunteering Matters we believe everyone in the UK should have the opportunity to thrive, so we bring people together to overcome some of society’s most complex issues through the power of volunteering. We partner with communities to overcome adversity, tackling social isolation and loneliness, improving health, developing skills and opportunities. And because we’re a national charity, we do this at scale, sharing our expertise and building partnerships to make an even bigger impact. We turn local knowledge and energy into action and progress, building stronger communities and a better future for all. Project Overview Our Volunteers Supporting Families in Edinburgh project offers practical and emotional support to families across the South East and South West localities of Edinburgh, empowering them to face a range of life challenges. We recruit, train and match dedicated, local volunteers to help families every step of the way, spending 1-1 time together on a personalised set of goals chosen by the family, for the family. We can help in many ways, such as improved living standards, budgeting, healthier eating, better school life and behaviour, access to health and wellbeing aid, as well as introducing parents to community resources, to name a few. So far, thousands of families across the UK have benefitted from our service and we are now delighted to extend the programmes reach to families in Edinburgh. Who can volunteer with us? Our volunteers are locally based people with an understanding of the challenges that families are facing. Aged 18+, each volunteer brings different life experiences and skills that they can use to help the family they are matched to, offering support on a weekly basis, usually for 6-9 months at a time that suits everyone. They build a strong relationship based on trust and mutual respect, acting as a friendly face who listens and cares about the family. All volunteers are interviewed, trained to the highest standards and undergo disclosure checks before being matched with a family. What can we offer volunteers? As well as the sense of achievement that comes through supporting a family, our volunteers will have the opportunity to learn and develop new skills, attend social events with other volunteers and enhance their employability. Certificates are provided upon completion of induction training and at the end of the commitment, with project staff happy to provide references for future studies or employment.

>Who we are: The African Council is an independent voluntary organisation with a mission to promote the social and economic welfare of African People. We celebrate the best in African culture(s), history and values. We promote the attainment of education and life skills especially among Africans. We also advance active citizenship among Africans through engagement in civic and political process, institutions and leadership. >Some of our projects: 1. Employment/Enterprise coaching events • The event seeks to provide coaching and empowerment for Africans through education, guidance and support, to increase Africans involvement in employment, enterprise and entrepreneurship opportunities. 2. Civic and Political structures coaching events • The event seeks to provide coaching that encourages and provides guidance to Africans, to increase involvement and participation of Africans in civic and political life in Scotland, 3. Engagement events • Our engagement events seek to understand the challenges and barriers that Africans face in participating in all areas of Scottish life and ways to mitigate these challenges. >Volunteering Opportunities: Volunteers are vital for delivering the African Council's projects and services. We are looking for volunteers to join our team and we currently have volunteering opportunities available in the following areas: 1. Website Support 2. Corporate Communications 3. Social Media Management 4. Legal 5. Digital marketing and advertising 6. Event planning, support and management 7. Research 8. Administration 9. Help desk >Benefits of volunteering with the African Council include: 1. Opportunities to learn new skills 2. Employability training 3. Meet new people 4. Networking opportunities 5. Flexible working times 6. Develop your skills and talent and turn it to something employers will be excited about 7. Boost your CV with relevant work experience\n8. Fun hangouts, as well as, 9. Satisfaction of being a part of team that will make a significant difference in Scotland Fantastic opportunities to help at a very exciting time in the development of the African Council. All help is greatly appreciated. For more information please contact Ca-ananay Maduka, Volunteer Coordinator at E Mail: info@africancouncil.org.uk or Tel.: 01224 579218.

We are looking for volunteers to work with Kirsty, our Let’s Grow project Community Gardener, who is based at the David Livingstone Birthplace in Blantyre. Let’s Grow is an employability and personal development project for school leavers who need support to help them move into the world of work. They are spending 2 days a week on work placement in the gardens and park area to gain valuable practical skills and experience. Volunteers will have the opportunity to be hands on with the gardening side and also support and mentor the young people. There is a large variety of gardening and maintenance tasks to be done – weeding, ground clearing, building compost bins, clearing leaves, path maintenance, pond cleaning, planting etc For most of our young participants this is their first experience of any kind of work. There is a maximum of 6 participants per group. Volunteers will be a valuable source of support for them to help build their communication skills, develop effective relationships and benefit from interacting with a positive role model. We are working with young people who have either recently left school or who are in the last 6 months of education but often not attending. All our participants require some form of support to help them make the transition from school to the world of work as they have various barriers. This includes lack of experience, low or no qualifications, health issues, hidden disabilities and particularly anxiety / poor mental health, lack of confidence and self-esteem. We have some with autism and / or ADHD.

Launch It Dundee was set up last year to provide affordable business premises and tailored support for local young entrepreneurs. We are part of the Launch It Trust, a group of charities all working towards the same goals. We work primarily with 18-30 year olds who are unemployed, under-employed or otherwise facing barriers to conventional employment, and provide them with access to subsidised office space and the business support they need to start and grow their own businesses. We are looking for a volunteer who has experience of enterprise and business start up. They will support our enterprise manager at our centre and will work directly with our young people. The role will include representing the charity with local organisations, recruiting and supporting our young entrepreneurs and offering enterprise training support. The role will be extremely varied due to the very small team and start up nature of the centre.

Gardener required to help cultivate Salvation Army land. Some experience in gardening required

Van driver required , must be aged 25 and over and hold a clean full driving licence.

Mentoring Young Talent (MYT) is seeking new volunteer mentors… MYT works with young people between the age of 12-26yrs, supporting them 1-1 to gain confidence, explore their strengths, help make future plans to either increase their educational attainment or secure a destination like work, training or further education. Our younger project (12-16yrs) provides mentors to care experienced school attendees while our project for 16-26 year olds aims to support young people locally who may be unemployed, struggling to identify their next steps, need to strengthen their skills and gain from the interaction with a positive role model. Everyone is welcome to apply to be a mentor, it’s a great way to give back, support local young people and share your knowledge and experience. We provide training, support and fund some great activities to take part in alongside your matched young person. This volunteer opportunity is also a great career development opportunity, increasing your own employability skills as a result. During Covid 19 we have seen many young people’s future plans dashed, unemployment rise and increased insecurity for this age group. Mentoring provides a positive way to help this generation, If you can manage between 1-2 hours a week please get in touch. We are seeking volunteers of all ages and life experience and have young people waiting.

Graeme High School in central Falkirk would like to engage with a volunteer who can lend their skills and experience as a hairdresser to enrich the experience of a group of secondary (3rd and 4th year) pupils who have chosen to study for a City & Guilds Level 1 Certificate in an Introduction to the Hair and Beauty Sector. As well as the mandatory theory units the pupils are presented for 3 practical units – Shampoo and Conditioning Hair, Plaiting and Twisting Hair and Styling Women’s Hair. The involvement of a volunteer who is an experienced hairdresser will add value to the pupil’s learning by offering the perspective of someone who has first-hand experience of the industry and knowledge of how the skills being learned might translate into future employment. This is not a formal teaching role and the successful volunteer will be fully supported at all times by the class teacher, they will not instruct the class on their own at any time or be responsible for managing the class. The volunteer is not responsible for any pupil’s accreditation however they would support the class teacher in assessing pupils’ practical skills by observing pupils’ work and completing prepared assessment checklists. Role Description: • Demonstrate various hairdressing techniques in a salon environment (specific techniques to be agreed with the class teacher in line with the various techniques pupils will learn for their City & Guilds course outcomes, for example braiding techniques) • Provide pupils with specific instruction on how to carry out the technique during the demonstration • Provide informal pupil feedback on their technique to help them to improve • Most techniques will be demonstrated on the salon training heads but pupils often pair up to practise techniques and staff would provide support with this Availability: The programme is delivered over the course of the week but for volunteering purposes the core commitment is all day on a Wednesday (8.50 am until 2.40pm with appropriate coffee and lunch breaks). If a volunteer is keen to offer more than that then other days and times can be identified. The class teacher will work with any interested volunteer to agree mutually suitable times, dates and sessions. COVID: Graeme High School have conducted a full risk assessment for this volunteer to engage with the school, and the class pupils. A full induction will be carried out by Jennifer Lauder (class teacher) before the volunteer undertakes any tasks, this will include general health and safety guidance, as well as the COVID specific measures in place. Graeme High School have appropriate insurance to cover engaging with volunteers in this role.

As part of the Library and Information service of Leisure and Culture Dundee, your role will be to work within an informal library environment to support customers to develop their basic I.T. skills. This role will have a focus on developing individuals skills to enable the customer to engage with Internet based welfare rights and employabililty systems. Main tasks include providing training to individuals covering a variety of basic I.T. skills such as sending emails and using search engines, helping customers to use databases and Internet based welfare rights and employability systems, and signposting customers to specialist agencies and services.