Great Article!

Check out this wonderful article on two PACTH programs!

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg​/11216/1164800-55.st

A Few Things

Hello-

So it has been awhile since I have posted- I apologize for this. It has been a packed filled few months. A few things:

-I am excited for the NAHRA conference that PACTH is hosting! Check the last blog post for the details! It is going to be great!

-The reason I have been away from the blogsphere is because I have just entered into a new phase in life. I have begun a new job in the EFT field – as an Equine Director at an inclusive Therapy Center in York County. I am setting up and then running their therapeutic riding program. Much more to come on the role as program director.

-I have found a bunch of great links through my process of setting up a brand new program – I will share them with you in later blogs.

Happy Winter Days of Riding!

-Megan

Conference!

We are excited to announce the upcoming NAHRA conference that PACTH is hosting. For more information please check out the PACTH website.

Resources

For those of you who live near Lancaster County, you might want to check out a new opportunity within their library system. The Lancaster County Public Library now offers an Autism Resource Center. It looks to have TONS of resources, games, and books related to Autism/Asbergers Syndrome. You can check it out more at http://www.lancaster.lib.pa.us/lcl/cwp/view.asp?a=1152&Q=465279&lclNav=|

 

Part 5:Recognizing Volunteers

How do we, as program directors and therapeutic riding instructors offer our thanks to the volunteers who make it possible for our program to run smoothly and efficiently? I believe strongly that recognizing those who give their time and energy to serve other people through their volunteer services is essential. Everyone wants to know that they are making a difference, they need to know that their work matters, and that they have a purpose within the organization or program.

How do YOU recognize volunteer within your program?

I spent some time researching this topic and came up with some interesting results. I enjoyed researching this topic because I think there are so many ways in which to recognize volunteers and some of the results I found were very creative and enjoyable to read. It sparked my creativity and I hope that it is able to spark your own as well.

A few of my favorite ideas are:

• Writing Thank You Notes. There is something special about receiving a hand written card or note letting us know that the work we are doing matters. Taking a minute to jot down some of the ways that you appreciate your volunteer and the work that they are doing can become a source of motivation and inspiration for your volunteer. They can see that you are serious enough to take time to write them a card that is personal.
• Having a Volunteer Recognition Dinner/Lunch. Have a meal for all your program volunteers in their honor. This can be a time to highlight the great things that your volunteers have done or are doing in your program.
• Take on the Job Photos. Documenting the work that your volunteers are doing is a good way to not only display the work of your program but also the people who are making it all possible. Just make sure that your program has signed photo release forms for all those who are in the photos being taken. Display these photos in your barn for all to see and framing the photos make great gifts!
• Be Organized. Some of you might read this and wonder what I am talking about. How does organization have anything to do with recognizing volunteers? I think in fact it does because when you are organized as a program it shows to the volunteers that you care enough about them that you are trying to make their job easier. Organization could include: lesson schedules posted, tack labeled for the horses that are to use them, schedule of where volunteers are to be working that day, etc. What are ways that YOU stay organized in you’re program?
• Ask for thoughts and ideas. Don’t be afraid to ask a volunteer what they think. If you have volunteers as part of your team for teaching a lesson, take time at the end of the lesson to hear their feedback. Not only are you getting valuable information from them but you are also showing them that you do care and value what they have to say.
• Introduce the Team. When teaching therapeutic riding lessons, make sure that you introduce all members of your team to the rider. While you are engaging the rider socially, you are also taking time to make sure that the rider and team realize it is not a one person gig but that in order for effective and safe lessons the whole team must be involved.

These are just a few ideas. Good websites to check out for more information are:

• http://www.idealist.org/en/vmrc/bestpractices/motivation.html
• http://www.volunteeringireland.ie/page.php?id=5
• http://4h.uwex.edu/resources/mgt/volunteer.cfm

Be creative! Let your volunteers know just how much of an impact they are having, not only in your life but in the lives around you as well.

Maintaining Volunteer’s Commitment

When you have good volunteers the last thing that you want to do is lose them. Volunteer burnout though is not only possible but can happen easily. How do we, as program volunteers keep our volunteers not only committed to our program but also loving what they are doing?

Urban Ministry in their article on the best practices for volunteer programs found that there are three motivations that volunteers have for giving their time and energy into serving. People can be motivated by:

• power
• achievement
• affiliation

Knowing what is motivating your volunteers can help with sustaining and encouraging your volunteers because each of these three motivations have different aspects of what gives energy back to the person. Once again, the Wisconsin 4H has some great articles on what motivates volunteers – touching on the same three aspects that Urban Ministry did. Check it out, learn what is motivating your volunteers so that you are able to place them in the situation that is going to be giving them energy.

What are other ways of keeping volunteers motivated, energized, and enjoying the time that they spend serving?

The Corporation for National and Community Service offers some great advice on how to sustain volunteers in non-profit organizations. They found that there are five important things to make sure as organizations we are looking into or doing. They are:

1. The program is clear about their mission, values, and goals. This would mean that as a program you are talking about why you are doing what your doing, that you are living out the values that you have created, and that you are talking about the goals you are meeting and the future goals on the program. By doing all of this you are ensuring the volunteer that their commitment is not only safe but that it is valued by a program that is constantly moving forward into the future.
2. The contributions that the volunteers make are appreciated. Everyone likes knowing that they are making a difference in whatever capacity that it is. Make sure that you are noticing and praising the great things that your volunteers are doing (look more for this in Part 5 of our volunteer series).
3. The volunteers are confident in the work that they are doing and able to do it. This means that volunteers are trained and oriented into the program – that education is not only addressed but held in high value. By providing education and support to your volunteers, you are empowering them to serve even more.
4. Volunteers hold ownership in their role in the program. Allow volunteers to help own and develop their role in the program. Let them be a part of the planning that you are doing for the volunteer projects, let them be a part of the assessment of the volunteer program and the education that they are provided with. At the end of a lesson make sure that you are getting the team’s input on how they felt the lesson went.
5. They are meeting the personal goals they brought with them. This goes back to the motivating piece. Know what feeds your volunteers, what motivates them and brings them energy.

(Paraphrased from The National and Community Service article on Motivating and Sustaining Volunteers. Can be accessed at http://nationalserviceresources.org/node/17148)

One of the huge pieces to this question is giving recognition to your volunteers – letting them know how much their time and energy means to your program and the ways that they are helping develop your program. This will be touched on in Part 5: Recognizing and Appreciating.

Once again, I am curious about you – your programs, maybe your role as a volunteer, or even as an instructor how you maintain the energy of your team.

What do YOU think about all this?

Volunteer Training: Empowering and Enabling

Volunteer training – a very important part of our therapeutic horsemanship programs, where we take steps to ensure the safety and the education of those who help make our lessons successful. How does volunteer training work in your program? If you are a volunteer in a program, what did your training look like? How can we make training’s purposeful and educational for all involved?

Before even beginning a training, I think that it is vitally important to take time to make skills progressions for each of the volunteer roles that we are training for. What do I mean by skills progressions? This is when we take something, in this case, a volunteer role, and we list all the skills necessary to be able to successfully be in that role. For instance, if we are going through the skills needed for a leader in our lessons what would it look like?

Role: Leader

Skills Needed:

- ability to walk/trot the horse in hand.

-knows body language of horse/leader.

-knows how to square the horse.

-heads (this is when the leader stands in front of the horse, creating a barrier for the horse to respect) the horse for long periods of time when just standing.

-knows how to successfully lead the horse through a ramp mount/ground mount.

That is just the beginning of a skills progression – it could continue for a leader but for the sake of you not reading a book, I will not finish it. But it gives you an idea of the processing that should happen before a training begins to be able to successfully train on all aspects needed for the volunteer’s role.

So, knowing and understanding all aspects of the volunteer’s role has been assessed. Now you need to do the actual hands on training, which for some of us might be easier then the skills progression itself. Hands on work is vital for the creation of successful and educated volunteers – especially if they are in roles where they are working with the horse. I highly recommend having training sessions for your volunteer’s whose role is in the lesson, where you can teach them or bring in someone to do the training, what your program’s expectation is for their role. There is probably nothing more frustrating for a volunteer then not knowing what is expected of them and how to do what is expected of them. Most importantly too, by training and educating, we are taking precautions and laying the foundation of safety in our programs. I can not highlight safety enough, it is essential for every program.

Is training a volunteer enough? When beginning to write this, I didn’t even think about another aspect of empowering and enabling volunteers that is vital. I guess I had just lumped it in with the training but I think its important to touch on so I am going to pull it out of the training part and give it it’s own place.

Orientation. Bringing volunteers into our programs and explaining the different aspects of what we are doing, showing them where things belong, and how to access the resources provided (tack, etc.). This is the part that I automatically lumped into the training, while it is a part of a volunteer’s training I think that it holds enough importance to be brought out into its own place. Have you thought about this part of a volunteer’s training? This is when the nuts and bolts of our therapeutic horsemanship programs are shown, when we get to lead someone through what we have created, maintained, and developed.

When you are doing a volunteer orientation what are some of the things that should be covered? Urban Ministry in their article that describes practices to have within your volunteer program says that orientation is the time that volunteers can “see their service within the organization.” It is within this time that you can show that “even the most menial tasks can become meaningful if presented in such a way that the volunteer understands how the task fits.”

Some of the things that can be explained within an orientation are:

• Where the tack room is and how it is organized. If you have charts that label the specific tack for each horse this is when you should go over it etc.
• The safety rules that you have in your barn and program.
• The mission and goals of your program – what you hope to accomplish through therapeutic horsemanship.
• Introduce your horses and the role that they play in your programs.
• Tour your facility, show where the turnout pastures are if volunteers play a role in this, where the tool shed is, etc.

These are just ideas. It is going to be program specific and is up you as the program director to create. These thoughts just give ideas of what you might want to have in your program.

I hope that this post has gotten your creativity sparking… I have shared my thoughts on volunteer training, training sessions, and volunteer orientations. The question is now, what do you think?

What are your thoughts after reading this post? Any ideas that you can share?

Part 2: Getting to Know Your Volunteer’s Gifts

I am always amazed by the different gifts that people have. They can be so vast and different. I love the creativity that it brings to the picture. Remembering that people have many different gifts and talents to bring to the plate is important to remember in therapeutic horsemanship when we think about volunteers. It is easy to get stuck in the thought that our volunteers have to be able to have some background with horses or at least be willing to work with horses. I think that there is a need in many programs for volunteers for roles that don’t involve horses.

Have you ever thought of, or implemented into your program, a skills inventory for new or interested in becoming volunteers to take? This would be able to give you a quick and easy assessment of talents that you might have never known. Perhaps someone has a background in advertising that you didn’t know about or photography skills that could be put to use. The list could go on and on, the possibilities once again are endless. The Wisconsin 4H has done a lot of research on volunteers, documenting their research and offering it to the public. On this site you can find helpful links such as a skills inventory that they offer for their volunteers to take. The National 4H site also has great resources for volunteers on their site. If you have time, with the winter coming up, take time to research these sites and other great sites that offer information that is valuable and credibly researched – this is incredibly valuable for our own continued education and further development of our programs.

Another idea, along the same line of thought is creating an Interest Survey which assesses the interests that your volunteers have. This is great to have because it insures that you are working together with your volunteer to place them in a role that they want to be in. This is another way of finding out what your volunteer likes to do and where their talents lie. What does an interest survey look like? It can be short and simple, highlighting the different areas in your program that volunteers are involved in. Everything from side walking, to mucking, to helping with the graphic design on your website, to helping organize the tack room, etc. This is another time when having already created and defined roles for volunteers can help.

Both ways of knowing your volunteers talents can be part of your volunteer intake packet. Creating a skills inventory and a interest survey allows you from the beginning (if you use it as part of your volunteer intake) to place your volunteer in a role that best suits their ability and allows them to be in a role they enjoy.

How do you choose the role that the volunteer plays in your program? Does your program have volunteer role descriptions?

Watch for Part 3: Volunteer Training: Empowering and Enabling!

Local Program Article

Thanks Pam Houldin for emailing me this article!

Check out this Central PA therapeutic riding program that was highlighted in the Altoona Mirror.

Horse Illustrated Article

I was randomly searching Horse Illustrated’s Website and I came across this interesting article on Therapeutic Horses.