join service network
Breadcrumb
Service Bits
Service Bits provides our service community with "bits" of service inspiration, tips, resources and read-worthy features.
Page 1 of 13 pages 1 2 3 > Last »
Wednesday, September 03, 2008
Developing Volunteer Work for Children
Posted by Gail Doyle,
This article appeared in the Sept. 2008 edition of Energize! Inc.'s monthly newsletter.
Even children under age 14 can be great volunteers, but much depends on your ability to design the right assignments for them. Experiment to find what works best in your setting. Here are some general guidelines, excerpted and adapted from our book, Children as Volunteers: Preparing for Community Service (Ellis, Weisbord, and Noyes, 2003):
- Beware of the myth that children will do anything "because they're young." The best jobs are ones children want to do.
- Avoid stereotyping. Assign work based on the interests of each child, rather than on some preconceived notions such as "boys like to work with their hands" or "girls don't like to get dirty."
- Children often have fewer prejudices than adults. Use this open-mindedness to create cross-cultural, intergenerational, or interracial assignments. Though initially children may need preparation in facing a new situation (seeing a person in a wheelchair, hearing someone speak with an accent), they overcome such superficial barriers more quickly than adults.
- On the other hand, children adopt the prejudices they hear expressed at home and may amaze you with their "opinions" on a variety of subjects. Therefore, do not assume open-mindedness and provide training before making a potentially embarrassing assignment. Children say what's on their minds.
- In designing roles, identify whether literacy is needed to accomplish goals and, if so, what reading level is required. This is an important clue to which child can do the job.
- Children need to see immediate results, even on a small scale. Define assignments as a series of short-term tasks with identifiable goals or projects. This can be as simple as saying "today your job is to play checkers with Mr. Jones," or "please pick up the litter in this area." One of the most effective techniques to keep children motivated is to give them a sense of accomplishment.
- Plan for some variety within each assignment. This will allow you to accommodate the physical, mental and emotional levels of different children. Offering assorted activities also keeps youngsters from getting bored and lets them choose what they really feel like doing at any given time. Attention span will vary with each child's age and maturity (and the nature of the task) -- another reason for offering options.
Write a position description for every assignment, even if the task is very simple or will be done by children who cannot read (you can explain it orally). Keep it short and informal, but present it seriously. When developing position descriptions for adult/child teams, do not fall into the trap of writing a single description aimed at the adult. The child needs her/his own version. This is your first chance to demonstrate your expectation that the child will be a fully-contributing partner in the work.
Tuesday, June 03, 2008
Managing the Budget Process
Posted by Gail Doyle,
This outline is from a presentation created for national service programs. This information, however, is useful to any nonprofit or community service organization working to create a budget.
What is a Budget?
A financial blueprint projecting expenditures for the grant award period, e.g. six months; one year; three years, etc. Uses:
- Management oversight
- Fundraising
- Accountability
- Forecasting
Why are Budgets important?
- It's a Corporation requirement
- All organizations must submit a budget
- Budgets become part of the contractual obligation - They provide a financial blueprint to follow and establish realistic goals and objectives for individual program/grant budgets and overall organization budgets
- Method for an organization to effectively allocate shared cost and resources across individual program or grant budgets
Managing the Budget Process
Qualities of an Effective Budget
- Realistic
- Consistent with organizational objectives
- Flexible (amendable if conditions are not as expected)
- Consistent with Corporation goals
Managing the Budget Process
Who should be involved?
The budget process should be a team effort that includes:
- Board of Directors
- Executive Directors
- Program/Project Director
- Program/Project Staff
- Fiscal Staff
Budgeting Basics
- Review program goals and objectives
- Estimate the cost of each goal or objective:
- Gather historical information
- Include both program and fiscal staff who will be involved in performing the activities related to the above goals and objectives
- Estimate direct program cost
- Estimate supporting costs (i.e., administrative expenses that do not correlate to a specific program activity) - Estimate total income
- Estimate grant revenues
- Estimate cash contributions
- Estimate in-kind contributions
- Review the organization's cash reserves
Budget Creation Checklist
- Review budget to ensure it is appropriate to accomplish goals and objectives outlined in proposal
- Ensure necessary resources are dedicated to enable successful completion of project
- Ensure that it is inclusive and covers all necessary costs of operation
Budget Narrative Preparation
- Organization should allocate costs based on a consistent and documented cost allocation plan. The plan can be based on level of effort or usage, for example:
- Level of effort: (percentage of time spent on activity x salary)
- Rent: (total CNCS program space/total host agency space) x rent = CNCS share
Budget Analysis and Review
- The budget process is like a journey . . . The budget represents the roadmap . . . During your journey you need to assess where you are in relationship to your ultimate goal.
-
How do you determine where you are?
- Perform variance analyses
- Determine how budgeted expenditures are actually expended
1) Evenly based on passage of time
2) Varied based on activities
- Identify potential areas of over-runs and under-runs
- Develop method to forecast expected final result
Budgetary Controls
What are budgetary controls?
Budgetary controls include:
- Regular monitoring of budgets to actual year-to-date and current period expenditures or outlays
- Explaining any budget variations that are unexpected or unusual and determining necessary adjustments
- Ensuring compliance with laws, regulations, and CNCS provisions, particularly matching percentage requirements
- Requesting prior approvals for modification, if necessary
Why have budgetary controls?
- Link programmatic activities and financial records
- Help organizations achieve budget targets and monitor program goals
- Prevent cost over-runs (and disallowed costs)if monitored on a regular basis
- Improve reliability of financial reporting
- Help staff responsible for specific activities to maintain control over expenditures
Basic Reminders
- Budget should be approved as part of a formalized process within your organization
- Approved Budget should be recorded in your accounting system (Recommended)
- The budget should be periodically reviewed against actual expenses, e.g. monthly, quarterly
- Categorize general ledger accounts to mirror budget categories
Key Budgeting Tips
- Increasing in-kind match reduces cash that must be raised to meet matching requirements
- Keep in mind the amount of documentation required to properly support expenditures, some expenses are more labor intensive to track than others
- Be aware of supporting documentation requirements. Service partners, may have good intentions but may not be able to obtain proper support for in-kind donations
- Identify in-kind donations prior to creating the budget -- will facilitate allocation of funds between Corporation and Grantee
- Divide the annual budget into smaller segments i.e., quarterly, monthly for meaningful comparisons
- Program and fiscal staff should review budget and be knowledgeable about funds available
- A budget is not a tool to allocate costs to grants, it is only a forecast
- Budget should be flexible to allow for unforeseen contingencies
- Individuals monitoring budget should know necessary requirements and thresholds for amendments
To successfully accomplish your program or project objectives within budget, all of the organization's staff must be on the same road, moving in the same direction.
Wednesday, April 02, 2008
Volunteering is Bigger Than the Nonprofit Sector
Posted by Gail Doyle,
Should volunteerism transcend the nonprofit world and spread its effects into the world of government and for-profit arenas? Susan J. Ellis, President of Energize, Inc., a training, consulting, and publishing firm that specializes in volunteerism, thinks that this topic should be discussed in light of the current presidential campaign.
"Too many politicians, commentators, academics, and the general public are unable to recognize that a giant part of the volunteer world is unpaid service on behalf of government, especially at the state and local level," she says. Her major discussion points:
- If we say that volunteering helps a nonprofit agency to stretch its budget and do more than the available funds would otherwise allow, why is it not as legitimate to speak of citizens serving in government agencies as a way to stretch the impact of tax dollars?
- Is the fact that government is highly unionized a key reason why politicians try to avoid rocking the boat in calling for citizens to volunteer in public agencies?
- What would be the political fallout if a candidate issued a challenge for all citizens to give 100 hours a year to some government service? More important, what would be the social impact of such collective action for the common good?
- How can we, as colleagues in volunteerism, assure that public agency volunteering is elevated to its rightful position as equal to nonprofit volunteering, and recognized as both the same and sometimes different?
- Is there any way that we can use the current presidential campaign to bring this issue to light?
Read this recent article on EnergizeInc.com.
Thursday, January 10, 2008
Great Program Evaluation Resource
Posted by Gail Doyle,
Start your organization's year off right by planning how your programs will be evaluated. Effective program evaluation can be a valuable tool when recruiting volunteers, raising funds, and providing information to fulfill grants requirements. The Free Management Library offers some great resources for program evaluation, including pitfalls to avoid, methods of evaluations, and how to analyze results.
Thursday, October 25, 2007
Map of the Volunteer World
Posted by Gail Doyle,
The volunteer landscape is vast. Who qualifies as a volunteer? What's the difference between service learning and internships? Are board members volunteers? Energize, Inc., offers a great guide to navigating the community service world. A handy chart breaks everything down into four distinct categories: formal volunteerism, community-based volunteering, special and unique categories, and infrastructure organizations vital to volunteer success. Check it out.