Written by Chayli Buenger, 577 Garden Fellow & AmeriCorps VISTA Member
April is National Volunteer Month, and this week (April 21 to 27) is Volunteer Appreciation Week.
Here at 577, we are expressing our gratitude to our volunteers for their service. In 2023, our volunteers completed more than 950 hours of service! This year, they are on track to complete even more than that. Our volunteers donate their time and skills to help with a variety of tasks to help us serve the community and support our mission.
Our volunteers help serve in several positions including in the Garden, Curiosity Shop, and Pottery Studio. We also have Group and Teen volunteers; and volunteers who help with administrative tasks.
Our Garden Volunteers meet weekly to help the Properties team on the grounds. They do a variety of work such as weeding, mulching, and planting. This year they have already cleared the brush for the new bee yard, mulched the community garden pathways, and helped plant the new courtyard. The Garden Volunteers are a huge help to the horticulturalists ~ especially in the summer months when everything (including the weeds) is growing like crazy. Additionally, this year, we welcomed two regular volunteer groups to help in the gardens ~ Sunshine Communities and Bittersweet Farms. These Group Volunteers have been a great help in keeping the pathways weeded so we can begin the season with the weeds under control.
We also welcomed a new Volunteer Beekeeper ~ Sara Gruberg. With the help of staff and volunteers from her Beekeeping 101 class, Sara installed a new hive in the new bee yard and in the Bee Room earlier this month.
The Curiosity Shop Volunteers help sort and price the book donations in the shop. Book donations come in daily so it’s a huge help to have our volunteers price the books and get them on the shelves quickly for customers to purchase.
The Pottery Volunteers help the pottery staff keep the studio organized, load and unload the kilns, and glaze pieces for the adopt-a-pot program. Did you know? The pottery pieces you may have seen available for purchase in the Curiosity Shop are donated to the adopt-a-pot program by students, and our pottery volunteers finish them with beautiful glazes so they are sellable. The pottery department staff is always busy offering a variety of popular classes, so it’s great to have volunteer help!
Our Admin Volunteers do a little bit of everything to help out with jobs at Virginia’s House. This year, for example, a collection of books was cataloged by a dedicated volunteer. And if you’ve come to a Music in the Gardens or Go Green Day and visited Virginia’s House, you would have been greeted by a volunteer at the door who is there to welcome guests into the house.
Finally, this year we launched our Teen Volunteer Program. You’ll find our teen volunteers this summer at our Music in the Gardens days offering free educational nature programming.
We could not do what we do without the help of our volunteers. We are so grateful for the time and dedication they put into being part of our team.
If you’re interested in learning more about our volunteer program, please complete the volunteer application form – CLICK HERE
THANK YOU, VOLUNTEERS!
