Celebrating our Volunteers on International Volunteer Day

Each year, International Volunteer Day falls on 5 December to formally raise awareness and acknowledge the important role volunteers play in our communities. Within The Salvation Army Australia, volunteers have always been an integral part of our services, bringing life to our values of integrity, compassion, respect, diversity and collaboration.

The Bethesda Aged Care Centre (“Bethesda”) Chaplain, Kath Hill, has the privilege of coordinating the volunteer program at the Centre and notes that she finds doing this very rewarding. “I’m the Chaplain here and I don’t just regard this as my job. I regard it as a calling from God. When I applied, I really felt God saying this is where I want you to be, so I said to Him, well, if this is where you want me to be, you’ve got to give me the skills to use, and it just flowed from there.”

One aspect of the volunteering coordination that Kath finds most rewarding is, “matching the volunteers to residents.” She likes to help residents connect deeply with a like-minded individual. “I may find someone who wants to sit down and play a game of cards with a resident.” Matching personalities is a big element of her role as the coordinator, she says.

The Centre currently has a volunteer who plays the piano for the Chapel service, which the residents love. When the volunteer is not there, Kath plays the songs from the CD player but “it’s never as good as the piano,” she chuckles. A member from the local church also volunteers, coming in on the first Sunday of each month to the Centre. Kath notes that this volunteer “really enjoys ministering to the older people.”

One of the many benefits of the volunteer program for the residents Kath notes, is its ability to add another aspect of care for the residents. “It’s important they have extra stimulation from different people. Just like we have different things that add to our life, well our residents need different people adding to their lives too,” she says. It also has given way to many unexpected friendships within the Centre also.

Volunteer Bill Oyen has been Weeroona Aged Care Centre’s (“Weeroona”) resident volunteer bus driver since 2008, where he was also working as the maintenance person at Weeroona.

Bill was previously an electrician by trade, officially retiring in 2006, and was looking for tasks to keep himself busy. He says, “I was visiting a person and from there it went on to maintenance and bus driving.” Bill says he finds the volunteer work extremely rewarding and his favourite element of the role is mainly the interactions with the residents. “I have come to know some of them,” he explains. “I know quite a few people at the Centre.”

Bill has no intention of stopping his volunteering efforts anytime soon either, noting, “as long as I have a license and I am still fit enough to do it,” he will continue being the resident bus driver at Weeroona. “I love connecting with people and getting to know them,” he says.