Volunteer Coordinators Forum 28Th May 2009

TRAFFORD VOLUNTEER COORDINATORS’ FORUM: Thursday 9th September Broomwood Community Centre, Timperley `

MINUTES

Attending Name Agency Maya Sharma VCAT Craig Almond VCAT Barbara Bleeker Trafford CVS & Volunteer Centre Tony Dagnall Trafford Carers Centre Toni Scandella Surestart- North Trafford Participation Worker Suzi Dodd Surestart Amanda Davis Surestart Annette Loftus Vinvolved Megan Ohri Volunteering in Greater Manchester Rebecca Parsons Trafford Council, Communities & Wellbeing Rob Sanders Trafford Youth Offending Service/ GM Fire Brigade Danielle Lowy Trafford Council, Scrutiny & Improvement Victoria Moody Trafford Council, Scrutiny & Improvement Brian Shaw (Cllr) Trafford Council Judith Lloyd (Cllr) Trafford Council Dolores O’Sullivan (Cllr) Trafford Council Kate Wels Action for Sustainable Living Jenny Heaven Trafford Citizens Advice Bureau Cath Demain Trafford Victim Support Monica Bannister Partington Healthy Living Centre Justine Lea-Grime Trafford Youth Offending Service Tess Gregson 42nd Street

Apologies Graham Tring Stockport CP in Trafford Diana Richardson Federation of Jewish Services Annie Muse New Way Forward Maureen Reilly Lostock Community Partnership

Welcomes & Introductions Maya welcomed everyone to the meeting. Members of the Forum introduced themselves.

1) Minutes and Matters Arising from last meeting Megan Ohri pointed out that the GM volunteering project is not overseeing the creation of a GM wide Volunteer Centre, rather coordinating the activities of existing Volunteer Centres. 2) Update from Trafford Council’s Communities and Wellbeing Directorate Communities and Wellbeing is the newly rebranded Adult Social Services. Rebecca Parsons told the meeting that their volunteer pilot will be ready to go into action in October. They are currently recruiting a Trainee Community Development Worker via the FutureJobs Fund (age restrictions apply to the post). The Volunteer Management Handbook for CWB staff is waiting approval from management. RP is happy to share with this group once it is officially adopted.

3) Trafford Health and Well-being Select Committee review of volunteering Present at the meeting were three elected members of the Committee and two support staff. The committee are looking at volunteering in Trafford and recognize that a lot of volunteering is happening and pointed to the way that 500 volunteers were mobilized during the cold weather at the start of this year.

The focus of the review will be:  Factors that motivate or discourage individuals to volunteer  Factors that motivate or discourage organisations to use volunteers

The review is limiting its scope to volunteers aged over 16 and living or working Trafford

Aims of the review are:  To develop resources to increase volunteer numbers in Trafford in all sectors  Recognition of good practice  Identification of motivations and barriers to volunteering

They will not, however, be allowed to make any recommendations that involve extra expenditure.

There then followed a breakout session where members of the Committee worked with small groups of Forum members to look at specific questions. Notes from this session were written up by Danielle Lowy, Scrutiny and Improvement Officer- Thanks, Danielle! A copy can be downloaded from www.vcatrafford.org/documents/vcf/16-9OSCworkshopnotes.doc

Members of the meeting said that they were happy to share their contact details with the committee in case there were further questions to be asked. For anyone not at the meeting Craig said he would forward communications from the committee to the wider mailing list.

The committee will be invited to a future meeting to feedback their findings to the Forum.

4) Measuring the Impact of Volunteering Maya Sharma and Megan Ohri delivered a brief workshop on methods for measuring the impact and value of volunteering.

This was a taster for the VCAT Training Course “Measuring the Impact of Volunteering”

This course is aimed at anyone who manages volunteers in their organisation and will help participants:  Develop knowledge and skills in how to monitor and evaluate the impact of volunteering  Gain practical ideas and resources to take back to their organisation  Develop strategies for tackling barriers to monitoring and evaluating their volunteer programmes The course is running on Tuesday 26th October from 9.30am to 4pm at St Johns Centre, Old Trafford. To book a place complete a VCAT booking form (http://www.vcatrafford.org/documents/VCATAutumn2010BookingForm.doc) and return it to [email protected]

5) Future meetings The next meeting will be held at 10 – 1, Tuesday 30th November. Venue to be confirmed.

Ideas/ requests for workshops included a session on working with refugees. Megan Ohri said that part of the work of the GM Volunteering project was increasing the diversity of volunteers and that her colleague Gwen Mason is leading on this piece of work. Anyone wanting more information should read the following leaflet www.vcatrafford.org/documents/vcf/gmvolunteering-diversity.doc