Tuesday, August 14th, 2007
A few updates for the members to keep the momentum building.
James Collins @VE
As members know James has agreed submit a brief post highlighting the issues around VCQA & ASDAN that he wished to discuss at the next meeting. This had been scheduled to go up last week - unfortunately I’ve just been informed that James is off ill and is not likely to be back in the office until the end of the month.
He has promised to make contact once he’s back on the job and members can look for a post in early September. This should leave plenty of time to digest his comments and possibly propose a few questions before the meeting.
Other Places
Just in case any members were looking for a bit of online reading - Mark Restall from Volunteering England seems to be posting his own thoughts on volunteer-related topics.
Early Day Comments
Overall response to the new site so far has been lukewarm but it’s early days yet. Remember that this is about building a sense of community amongst a group of organisations that have common interests - members will only get back what they put in.
With that thought in mind the comments function is now open to the public. It seems that the requirement to register/log-in before being allowed to leave comments only served to confuse people. The downside of this is that the site is more susceptible to spam - but we will keep an eye on this. The upside is that it will be easier to engage when you have an urge to share. When leaving comments please try to follow two simple rules:
- When giving your name (this is required) please make reference to the CENTRE/BUREAU/AGENCY you work at - not everyone knows everyone else by name.
- Please be consistent in how you fulfill rule #1 above - if you are ‘Michael @VC Slough’ then always try to be ‘Michael @VC Slough’ ….not several variations on the theme. Again, this will help everyone understand who you are.
Friday, August 3rd, 2007
The next meeting of the Network is scheduled for 20 September and will be held from 11am to 3pm at the MIC Conference Centre. The venue is near Euston Station (see map) and should be easy to reach for those coming in on public transport.
Members should watch for an email invitation (which will be sent out through the the free web application called MyPunchbowl.com) and be sure to use the link in the email to let us know if you plan to attend.
James Collins from VE will be attending the meeting to discuss the new ASDAN Certificate and the next cycle of the VCQA process. We will post a short entry from James early next week outlining the topics he plans to cover - so check back and post any comments you have in response. We’ll check these before he meeting to ensure that James is well prepared.
Wednesday, July 18th, 2007
This entry is not a complete reprisal of the 2012 Culture & Community SubGroup that met in Brighton on 3 July. Instead it will flag the main issue that need concern the network - the development of the 2012 Volunteering Strategy - and ask network members how they wish to respond?
The brief version of the story is that LOCOG commissioned a group (including VE, the Home Office and the Commission on the Future of Volunteering) to draft a Volunteering Strategy for 2012. This was due to be launched around about now but due to reasons not yet made public it looks as if the overall strategy document will not be adopted. There has not been, to date, a public announcement as to whether this is true or not or, if it has been dropped, why the strategy was not retained. There are are whispers of issues about diversity & equality and/or an unclear remit re: who was obliged to agree take up the strategy.
Whatever the reasons it now seems that the official approach to developing volunteers will be led by an internal group within LOCOG with responsibilities for workforce development and that instead of a fully stated strategy this group will produce a set of action points.
Three main issues were raised with the Regional representative from LOCOG on this front:
- that grass roots volunteer agencies were being left in the dark as to how the original strategy was being developed and the fact that it was currently under threat;
- that many local VCs were unclear as to whether they would be asked to play an active role in the recruitment and development of 2012 volunteers or whether they woud find themselves in competition with a regional body who bypassed them to recruit directly in their area;
- that LOCOG should take a careful look at thier tendancy to say that they ‘have 70,000+ volunteers signed up’ as there is a notable difference between entering your email on a website five years before the event and actually showing up to volunteer!
No doubt the circumstances around the development and implementation of the 2012 approach to volunteering will change quickly over the next few weeks and we should take note of these developments. But members may wish to spend some time thinking about what we, as a group, need in order to properly assist with and benefit from what promises to be a once in a lifetime opportunity in our region.