News

Volunteering for 2012

London 2012's third Changing Places day on 19 September saw a record 20 volunteers, turn up to help improve the environment around Limehouse Cut canal in East London, including tidying up habitats, picking up litter, removing graffiti and managing vegetation. The last opportunity to help with various environmental tasks across the Olympic host boroughs is on 15 November (Bow Creek). You can find out more details about the event and how to volunteer by clicking on the respective dates in our Events Calendar.

Changing Places is just one of the volunteering opportunities in the run-up to the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games taking place in London. London 2012 are encouraging anyone interested in being one of the 70,000 volunteers at the Games to volunteer at one of the many events going on in London to gain experience.

If you can register your interest to volunteer at the Games, London 2012 will let you know when the application process opens in 2010. The Mayor of London is also looking to recruit up to 12,000 City Volunteers to meet the demands of the influx of visitors as well as Londoners whose everyday lives will be affected by the Games. They will be based at airports, mainline train and Tube stations, major visitor attractions and other key locations to welcome and provide information and directions. It is intended that the volunteers will be stationed near to where they live or work in order to make use of their specialist local knowledge. More details about the City Volunteers programme will be available in 2010.

National volunteer development agency Volunteering England is currently working with online charity Youthnet and volunteer portal Do-it on the Inspiration and Legacy project to enable anyone inspired the 2012 Games to find relevant, local volunteering opportunities.

Capital Clean Up

With all eyes on London for the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games, Londoners can 'do their bit' to improve the local environment and keep their city clean, as part of the Capital Clean Up campaign, with a view to creating a long term sense of ownership and pride from which we all benefit. The campaign will comprise a whole series of events across the 33 London boroughs. For more information about organising or volunteering at an event, please watch this space!

Personal Best

If you are not in work or education and have no qualifications, you can do Personal Best, a training programme designed to provide people with the skills needed to succeed in a job. Students have the opportunity to volunteer for 30 hours and receive a Level 1 qualification. They also have a chance to be a Games Time volunteer at the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games, as everyone who completes the programme is guaranteed an interview.

Wave of Friendship

Live in London but fancy volunteering at an event in Scotland? Now you can obtain financial assistance through the Wave of Friendship programme. Scots who want volunteer at a London event can use the London Events Volunteering Calendar.

Knitting for the Olympics

Anyone can get involved in 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games, you don't need to be a sportsperson, or even engage in volunteering. Indeed, you don't even have to get up off your sofa. Quilts4London is looking for "quilters, felt makers, embroiderers, textile artists, in fact anyone who sews (or not)" to express their support for the 2012 Olympians, Paralympians and Special Olympians through the "medium of fabric, fibre and stitch". Whatever your age or ability, you can have a go at knitting a Textile Pennant (or mini Quilt). The idea is to give each athlete a Pennant as a memento of their involvement.

Can you help during an emergency?

Would you like to be there when someone needs it most? The British Red Cross needs volunteers for their incident support team in London to deal with evacuations, fires, power cuts and medical emergencies, alongside more regular duties of maintaining equipment and vehicles, training and exercises. Across the UK, their trained volunteers respond to hundreds of emergencies every year. Volunteers will need to be flexible and be able to commit to shifts based at one of our operations complexes in London. They are trained to do extraordinary things, particularly providing practical and emotional support to the vulnerable at incidents across the capital.

A Day in Hand

You can stand up against homophobia by holding someone's hand. Even if you're straight and the other person is the same sex. On A Day in Hand, you can be part of an international event to support the visibility of Lesbian, Gay, Bissexual and Transgendered (LGBT) people. Whether for just a minute or the whole day, Londoners can hold the hand of someone of the same sex. This year's event on 26 September was in memoriam of the recent shootings at a Gay & Lesbian bar in Tel Aviv and the ongoing atrocities against LGBT people in Iraq. For more information, visit http://www.adayinhand.com.

Music volunteering for Oxfam

Oxjam 2009 has now ended. How does Volunteering at a music event in aid of internationational development sound? What are you doing October 2010?

Making a Difference in 2010

CSV's Make A Difference Day, the UK's largest day of volunteering is an opportunity to plan your own event involving volunteers, perform an Act of Random Kindness or simply join in with something that is already going on in your area.