Microvolunteering Party
Microvolunteering can be fun, especially with a group of friends, knowing that you are collectively doing some good with bite sized actions that you can participate in at any time and whenever you choose! The downloadable version of the instructions below, are available here.
Choose a Date and Time
1) make it convenient for the group of friends you’re inviting
Choose a Venue
2) could be your own home, a student’s room, a public place. Anywhere really, so long as several people can access the internet at the same time. You should ensure you have a pc or laptop for others to access the net
Grab Some Friends
3) 
ask them to bring along a wi-fi enabled device (but it’s not a problem if they don’t have one, as you’ll be providing internet access anyway)
4) 
aim for a group of about six people to participate: it’s an easily manageable number
A5 size Invitation
5) 
use our freely downloadable invitation available opposite (optional). Tick off the items you wish your friends to bring along to the party
6)
invite them to bring along some food, drink and pyjamas (optional) – yes pyjamas, read on!
Prepare a Few Things
7) choose from our range of suggested actions by clicking the button opposite. If you want to choose from our general website, feel free but we don’t provide the same information for you to prepare things
8 ) get together some materials relevant to the actions (we tell you what) and then grab some bite and drinks, unless you’ve requested your friends to bring some along
9) where appropriate, create an account with the 3rd party initiative websites. Details needed are very basic and they won’t spam you. This is to save time at the party, where everybody can login straight away without waiting for email confirmations
A4 size Sheet
10) download our handy task sheet opposite, showing you at-a-glance which actions require what materials, time needed, brief description etc. Print it off, as it will also enable you to tick off what tasks have been completed and by whomOn the Night (or Day)
11) put some background music on (duh!)
12) inform your friends as to how the party is to going to be run, ie action description, action participation, party duration (usually 1 – 2 hours), competitive element (see below), awarding certificates (see below)
13) assign all or half the group to do particular actions (this is where it’s handy to have as many internet enabled devices as possible). Some actions give you an option to introduce a fun competitive element into the party (we tell you which ones)
14) you can fill in our task sheet to see who’s done what task. The task sheet contains a scorecard, in case you want to hold a competition and keep a record of participants scores in some of the microvolunteering games on offer
A4 size Award
15) wrap the party up by filling in and handing out some of our freely downloadable ‘Recognition Award’ certificates, opposite (optional). Thank everybody for coming and for the impact they have made towards worthy causes around the worldAfter the Party!
16) upload some of your party photos to our Flickr account or send them via our Contact Us page and we’ll upload them ourselves. We want to show who’s changing the world via microvolunteering, whilst having an incy wincy bit of fun on the side as well! Oh, and if you can wear some pyjamas for the pics with a sign saying, ‘We changed the world in just our pyjamas!’, that’ll be great. Why? Just take a look at our tagline at the top of our website!
17) now go and tell other people about the meaningful moments you spent microvolunteering. Oh, and point them to this Party page – that would be nice as well!
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Feedback
Volunteer Centre West Lindsey - “We thought it was fab…”
The Last Word
The Microvolunteering Party project is a subsidiary scheme of the Help From Home initiative. It’s sole aim is to encourage and inspire youth (although of course you don’t have to be young to enjoy a good ol’ party!) to volunteer their time for the benefit of others and thus instil a sense of altruism from an early age.