The Willow Glen Resident

Young volunteers have a new exchange program

By John Pancharian

Most high school students would consider a night spent playing bingo at the local old folks' home only marginally better than purgatory. Not so for Aida Echeverria, a Willow Glen High School senior who decided to give her time and caring to residents at the Willow Glen Convalescent Hospital.

The Santa Clara County Volunteer Exchange will now make it easier for other local youth to give their time by offering a new centralized Youth Services Program.

The Volunteer Exchange is a referral service that maintains a database of more than 600 Santa Clara Valley nonprofit organizations. The service recruits residents interested in donating their time, assesses their interests and abilities, then matches them with an organization in need of volunteers. The exchange also offers training to nonprofits in organizing volunteers; publishes newsletters detailing volunteer opportunities; and forms partnerships with local corporations that have their own volunteer programs.

Since opening its doors in 1987, the Volunteer Exchange has averaged about 16,000 referrals annually.

"We get over 5,000 calls a year from junior high and high school students in the county, including Willow Glen," youth services coordinator Nicole Ozzer said.

Echeverria said she enjoyed her experience volunteering in Willow Glen. She began attending Thursday bingo games with Willow Glen Convalescent Hospital residents last September, and said she valued the relationships she developed during that time. Echeverria was very matter-of-fact while describing how she ended up volunteering at the convalescent hospital.

"I just wanted to do some community work for fun," she said. "I said [to exchange staff] that I wanted to work with old people, and that one was the closest to my school, so I went there."

Like the exchange's adult program, youth services both refers volunteers to organizations that can use their help and provides training to help organizations best use youth volunteers.

"These volunteers are not kids, but they do need structure," Ozzer said. "I think young people in many ways have even more to offer than adults," she said.

The new youth service will also train a Youth Services Team, a group of volunteers ages 12 to 17, who will teach other students how to use the exchange, find new youth-oriented opportunities to volunteer and plan an annual Youth Service Conference. The conference will provide young volunteer organizers with a forum for learning and networking with one another.

With an eye toward the same goal of helping young people better organize themselves to volunteer, the Youth Services Program will maintain a resource library for school and youth service clubs, providing organizers with information about how to raise funds and create effective programs for themselves.

"There hasn't been anyone in the county who has been a resource for youth volunteers," Ozzer said. "There's never been a central place to come."

For more information, or to register with the Volunteer Exchange, call 247-1126, or visit the Web site at www.volunteerexchange.org.

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