Profile of a Volunteer

The person that I am choosing to profile here is my daughter Jordan.  She was fortunate enough to learn at a young age the true meaning of volunteerism.  She was selected as a Junior Rotarian her senior year of high school and they were required to participate in a service project.  The service project she selected was "Rebuild Oklahoma".  This particular projects mission is to go into a poverty stricken neighborhood and remodel a persons house to make their daily life better.  When we received the address of the location for her rebuilding project my husband chose to drive her and drop her off for her safety.  This was a high poverty and high crime area close to downtown Oklahoma City.

One hour into the project she called her dad to come get her because there were so many roaches and rats in the crumbling home they were remodeling.  Her dad told her that he would return at 5:00 pm when the day was supposed to be finished because she started this and she needed to finish it.  When he picked her up at 5:00 pm she was a different person.  It changed her life because they were able do so much to improve the home when the 70 year old women returned home with her 2 young grandchildren that she was raising she fell to the ground and sobbed because her house was beautiful.  Jordan has never been the same person as she was before she made a difference in the life of the woman and her grandchildren. 

Jordan has continued to volunteer in different ways since that time, but that particular event was the one that made the most dramatic impact on others.  She has been a "Big Brother/Big Sister" volunteer, Legal Aid volunteer, Rise School volunteer and is currently volunteering at Cleveland County courthouse reading legal documents for people that cannot afford to have legal representation prior to entering the court room as a part of her Law School training.  Her goal in life is to help make a difference in the lives of women, children and families in poverty by creating family friendly policies that will make a difference in our country.  I am proud to be her mom and excited to see the woman and volunteer she will become when she graduates from Law School.  I know she will be something great and we will all benefit from her work in the future.

I would like to think that Jordan learned her love of volunteering and advocating for the less fortunate from me.  I have dedicated my life to working on behalf of children and families.  Currently in the capacity of ensuring that they have highly trained teachers working in high quality child care programs.  I think to be an effective advocate you have to be passionate and have some experience that shows you that this work is important and you will make a difference.  To me the vital "take-away" is you don't have to do something big to make a big difference.  All Jordan did that day with Rebuild Oklahoma was tear down old wall paper, wash walls and hang new wall paper; however, it was transformational for the family and her.  You get out two fold what you put into something.  Go out and spread the good work.

Using Social Media to Get Connected

I am a social media junkie.  I have a Facebook account, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn.  I think that Facebook and Twitter are the most effective for advocacy, but I can how LinkedIn could be used as an advocacy tool.

I am far more of an advocate on Twitter than I am on Facebook.  I live in a very conservative state and I am a liberal political person.  I have fewer friends on Twitter so I cause far less drama for myself than I do when I post advocacy efforts that I am passionate about sharing.  I post early childhood issues, women and children's issues and issues about poverty on Twitter almost daily.  I am an active tweeter.

I think both Facebook and Twitter are great ways to get information quickly and get it moving outward to the people.  I also subscribe to many newsletters that provide advocacy information to the field of early childhood.  I think social media allows us to be more connected and be more vocal about our passions than prior to social media.  It allows us to share content in real time as it is happening.  Everyone can be a contributor of information when social media is the vehicle of choice.

I use social media to share information that I am passionate about to others.  I hope that people re-tweet my information so that many more people are informed about issues that are meaningful to me.

The 4 C's of Social Media are content, collaboration, community and collective intelligence (Global Voices, 2009) and I think that these are critical themes when it comes to using social media as an advocacy tool.




Reference

Mishra, G. (Global Voices).  2009, May 11.  Digital activism & the 4cs social media framework.  Retrieved from:  http://advocacy.globalvoicesonline.org/2009/05/11/digital-activism-the-4cs-social-media-framework/

Advocacy Messages

Reviewing the Ad Council's website was interesting and the public service announcement that first caught my eye was Book People Unite!  I love the video for the Book People Unite campaign.  The following is a link to the YouTube video http://youtu.be/pdpKIjpaBU8
http://www.bookpeopleunite.org/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pdpKIjpaBU8&feature=player_embedded#t=0


The other campaign that I thought was very good was "The Breath Easies".  The videos as well as the pictures were very eye catching for children and families with a valuable message. 

 

 

I also think that families learning to recycle is a great way to show that you care about our planet.  I love this poster from the Ad Council on recycling.  The poster is subtle and informative.  I love it!