Volunteer

Most of what we do runs on the hard work of our amazing, dedicated volunteers.

Although we have a large contingent of regular volunteers for our programs below and are currently not actively recruiting more, we are always happy to hear from others who want to help out. Learn more about where our volunteers help below, and feel free to fill out our Volunteer Application. Someone will be in touch if we have an opening.

 

Thrift Store

Our Thrift Store is open Monday to Friday 11am-3pm. Our thrift store volunteers help with sorting donations and keeping the store tidy.

Lunches for Learning

Our Lunches for Learning program relies on a lot of dedicated volunteers to be successful. We have some who help with packaging the food, others who cover the table when clients pick up, and still others who help to deliver to those who can't make it here to pick up.

While all of these positions are currently filled, we are happy to have a list of back up volunteers who are perhaps not available regularly, but want to make themselves available for us to call if ever we have a volunteer cancel last minute. This can be for both the pickups or deliveries (Saturday and Sunday mornings).

To volunteer for this, contact Sara at marketing@vincentplacessm.ca or 705-253-2770 ext. 202

Soup Kitchen

Our Soup Kitchen runs on a team system. If you've got a group of like-minded people who want to help out, we're happy to have you. Here's how it works:

Our Soup Kitchen serves dinners on Wednesdays and lunches on Saturdays. Each team signs up for either Wednesday or Saturday, and the teams will then rotate serving the meal on their designated day. The frequency with which teams will have their turn varies based on the number of teams we have that year - right now, we've got 13 teams on Wednesdays and 16 teams on Saturdays, so each team serves a meal about every 3 months, for a total of 4 meals throughout the year. The Soup Kitchen schedule is set in early December for the following year, so teams have plenty of time to plan for their turns.

So what exactly is involved in the teams' turns serving? Each team is responsible for planning, purchasing, preparing, serving, and cleaning up after the meal when it is their turn. Wednesday teams need to prepare a dinner - often pasta, pork tenderloin, or a stew - while Saturday teams need to prepare sandwiches (we take care of preparing soup to go with them). We generally recommend that a team have from 6-10 members, but meals can be served successfully with as few as 4, and it's never a bad thing to have more team members available in case someone is unavailable.

The number of individual meals served varies based on the point in the month, but we generally recommend that teams are prepared to serve about 100 to 150 meals.

Depending on what is served, the cost usually comes in at around $200-250 per meal. To cover that cost, some teams will do fundraising, collect among church groups, or find a business sponsor. Some teams are groups of coworkers that are sponsored by their employer.

If you think you might be interested in starting a soup kitchen team, get in touch with Sara (contact info below). To ensure you can make it onto the next year's schedule, get in touch by early November.

​Sara McCleary
705-253-2770 ext. 202
marketing@vincentplacessm.ca

Events

We do need a lot of volunteers to help with our two annual events - the Coldest Night of the Year and the Big Blue Food Drive. Both of these are great opportunities for those interested in helping out but not committing to coming in regularly, or for students looking for volunteer hours. Please check out our Events pages to learn more, or contact Sara.