If you enjoy volunteering, you will keep on doing it. This handbook aims to help you to find out what sort of volunteering appeals to you. You may know exactly what you want to do, or you may not have a clue. Our office has Project Fact Sheets on each project, and extensive information on what exactly is involved; and our office staff are always there to help you find what would suit you best.

Making your choice

Before you come into the office it is useful if you can consider how much time you would like to spend volunteering, and when you are available. Crucially, you must be reliable, so be realistic about how much time you can spare, so that you don’t take on more than you can cope with.

For most projects enthusiasm and commitment are far more important than any previous experience.

Don’t worry if you feel unsure of yourself at first – volunteers often need a bit of time to settle in. We want you to enjoy volunteering, so if things really aren’t working out, or there are any problems, please remember that there is loads of support on offer. You can talk in confidence to the SCA Project Leader (for our own projects), to any member of our Steering Group or Executive Committee, or the office staff. Please let us know if you are not happy – if we don’t know that anything is wrong, we can’t help!

CRB Disclosures and References
Volunteers wishing to work on SCA run projects must be prepared to complete a CRB disclosure, to ensure you do not have any convictions for relevant offences. For most projects we also require two character references. All references and personal details are treated confidentially and, where appropriate, according to the Data Protection Act and/or CRB requirements.

Please note, the organisation you are volunteering for is responsible for its own screening procedures and these may differ from those of SCA.

For more information about the volunteer screening procedures of your chosen organisation please see the project fact sheets in the SCA office.

CRB DISCLOSURES

Forms are available from the SCA office, along with detailed instructions for filling them out. To complete the form you will need to be able to list the full address(es) of where you have lived for the last 5 years and confirm your identity by showing us one of the following: Passport, Birth Certificate or UK Driving Licence. You will also need to show us proof of you current address i.e. utility bill, College bill, bank statement etc. and one further document which will confirm your identity, for example NHS card, exam certificate, marriage certificate, National insurance card etc A full list of acceptable identity documents is available from the SCA office.

REFERENCES

We require the names and addresses of two people, each of whom must have known you for at least 2 years. They must not be related to you, or from your own peer group. We will write to your referees, describing the project you have volunteered for and ask for a character reference. If you wish, you can see the letter and form that will be sent to your referees.

IDENTITY CARDS

All volunteers working with our own projects are issued with an SCA ID card – we will need a passport size photo of you for this please. ID cards are compulsory and you may be asked to show it when you begin working on the project. Please note that ID cards need to be renewed each academic year (if you bring in your old ID Card, we can reuse the photo).