The Senior Corp program is able to connect those over the age of 55 with multiple organizations that need their services. The Corporation State Offices are staffed by federal employees and are responsible for creating grants and projects as well as oversee the Senior Corp program projects. They provide contact information from every state and will help provide information about certain projects and organizations within the local community.
Benefits Offered
Senior Corps offers the benefit of helping others by becoming a mentor, a coach, a faithful companion, and use a volunteer’s job skills to provide assistance for different projects and organizations. Senior Corps allows the wise and skilled to connect with thousands of others in an effort to combine their skills and help those that need it. As many as 500,000 people are linked under Senior Corps.
Programs Available
A few programs available include the Foster Grandparent Program, The Senior Companion Program, and the RSVP program. The foster grandparent program allows volunteers to connect to children who are in need of their support. The Senior Companion program allows volunteers to help out others who are unable to do simple, everyday tasks such as shopping or chores around the house. The volunteer takes the role of a care-taker and assists the individual with their daily activities and light chores that need to be done. Finally, the RSVP program connects volunteers to local programs around their communities. They use their acquired talents to achieve certain tasks around the community that are in need of their assistance.
Senior Corps Guidelines
In order to achieve success, the Senior Corps volunteers follow such guidelines as teamwork, diversity, capability, flexibility, and service-learning. Teamwork is important because volunteers will often work in teams in order to get the job done faster. Diversity branches out the people into many groups including gender, age, ethnicity, and physical ability. The presence of volunteers and what they are capable of doing is very important in Senior Corps.
Skills
Those with the right skills are able to achieve excellent results in whatever task they are completing. Flexibility allows an individual to move around the fields and shift from one task to the next to suit their specific needs of interest. Volunteers will also develop new service skills and experiences through training. Volunteers aren’t required to know certain skills so instead they will learn them for the task at hand.
Rewards
The rewards of joining the Senior Corps is the impact that it will create in local communities. Every year, we hear thousands of success stories that have repaired problems within a community. We hear about the positives of helping others and taking care of the unfortunate.
Senior Corps has been around since John F. Kennedy’s presidency and it will only continue to grow in the future. There are thousands of groups and organizations that are ready to be positively impacted by the assistance of Senior Corp volunteers. For a Senior Corp volunteer, their golden years are just beginning and the impact they bring upon society will always and forever be remembered.
Please visit here to contact your local Senior Corps office and get started!