Celebrating Volunteer Week with our Volunteers & Coordinators
For National Volunteers Week, Families of Veterans Guild invited all our Friendship Line, Birthday Calls and Social Club Volunteers for a lunch at the Chatswood RSL.
It was a great opportunity for our President, Queen Dunbar, our CEO Renee Wilson and our team to thank our volunteers for their priceless contribution to our community and our organisation.
The lunch was very well attended, the volunteers enjoyed getting together for a chat and a laugh. The food was lovely, the War Widows Program team provided great support and information to support the Volunteers. Members met fellow volunteers and discussed running Guild and Social Clubs and/or Friendship Line or Birthday calls.
Providing updates
Important updates regarding volunteering opportunities, The Digest, newsletters, and meeting schedules were shared during the event. Members were informed about upcoming activities and encouraged to get involved in various initiatives aimed at enriching both their own lives and the wider community.
Thank you
At the lunch, our CEO, Renee Wilson, provided a moving speech thanking our volunteers and highlighting the impact of their contribution in our community. We would like to extend this thank you to all volunteers who were unable to attend the lunch.
To our volunteers, we would like to say thank you for all that you do for each other, for other war widows and our organisation.
For more than 78 years we have relied on the support and good work of the volunteers in our community to service thousands of war widows in NSW. Together you all keep them connected, supported and included – you provide the gifts of friendship, time and support – the value of which cannot be underestimated. You give so much of yourselves so freely to the organisation, our cause, your peers that thank you doesn’t seem enough.
Across the state we have 83 volunteers without whom it would be impossible to deliver the War Widows Program. In the last 12 months, this is the collective impact you have had:
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- Held 630 war widows social/ guild club meetings.
- Engaged 1,073 of war widows around NSW every month through your meetings.
- Made 5,472 of phone calls through the friendship line.
- Made 1,200 birthday calls to war widows aged over 90 years.
- Supported 456 of war widows experiencing social isolation; and
- Hand written more than 2,100 Christmas cards for members.
These are significant achievements – together you are impacting the lives of more than 2000 war widows in NSW – incredible!
At the end of her thank you speech, Renee added “When I think about the words of the war widows motto, particularly the words “it is in serving each other and in sacrificing for our common good that we are finding our true life” I think of you all. You live and breathe this motto every day in all that you do for your community and it is our honour and privilege to be of service to you.”
Lunch Pictures
