April is when showers bring May flowers, and it’s also National Volunteer Month. This is an opportunity to applaud and appreciate the contributions of volunteers and reflect on your own capacity to volunteer your time and expertise. As nursing professional development (NPD) practitioners, volunteering is woven into the fabric of nursing. Taking time to help others, assisting those in need, and doing good to benefit another person or cause is something that comes very naturally to nurses. ANPD’s NPD team enjoys giving back to the community in a variety of ways, which we are sharing with our readers to hopefully inspire you to get involved, too.

Naomi Fox, DNP, MSN, RN, NPD-BC, CCRN, Director of Education, uses her love of running to raise money for awareness and research. One of the charities she is passionate about is the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation. She has also helped raise funds for Strides for H.O.P.E. Pediatric Epilepsy, Action on Pre-eclampsia, and Children Without Borders. Each race Naomi has finished helps to create awareness and advance care for these important causes. She also volunteers as a running coach for people who are new to the sport or working to achieve specific goals.

“Using a hobby I enjoy as a tool to help others is fulfilling. It’s no longer something for me; it’s about helping someone else find something they love,” she said. 

Mentorship and career coaching are another way to volunteer your time for the benefit of others.

As an NPD leader, Naomi has advocated for the volunteer role by formally adding participating and organizing volunteer activities into an NPD clinical ladder program, supporting protected time and resources for volunteer activities to take place, and integrating volunteer work in the surrounding community of Essex County, New Jersey, into a nurse residency program.

Mary Smith, MSN, RN, NPD-BC, NC-BC, AMB-BC, C-EFM, CCE, NPD Program Manager, leverages her nursing knowledge and skill to give back to her community. Leaning on decades of experience in obstetrics and gynecology, she serves her local community by volunteering for an organization that provides domestic violence intervention in Chicago and surrounding communities, primarily supporting female survivors. It even became a family affair when her partner also volunteered for the organization.

Another driver for Mary’s passion for volunteering is a desire to give back to the nursing community.  As a board-certified nurse coach, she provides pro bono coaching to help nurses align their career trajectories with their passions. She’s worked with both early career nurses and nurses considering transitioning to new specialties mid-career.

“Nursing has such breadth in the tremendous variety of work that can be done under a single professional license,” she said. “For many, leaving the profession can be averted by digging in to discover how a nurse wants to practice, and helping them to get to that place.”

Mary wears a volunteer NPD practitioner hat while serving as a peer reviewer for American Academy of Ambulatory Care Nursing publications. Sharing feedback and expertise is pivotal to the advancement of the profession. Mary sees volunteer peer reviewing as an opportunity to support nurses, particularly those less familiar with writing for publishing, in disseminating their work.

“The feedback given during a peer review is intended to help authors convey to the intended audience their work and to advance the profession. It’s not just about helping those authors, but also helping countless nurses who might read that article and incorporate the content in their own work. And the cycle goes on, ultimately impacting health outcomes.”

Rebecca Brown, DNP, RN, NPD-BC, RNC-LRN, NPD Program Manager, loves the family unit, and this flows through the volunteer work she does. From larger volunteer endeavors such as being the camp nurse for a local week-long children’s camp to shorter opportunities like holding a crying baby in the church nursery, each experience helps make someone’s day better. Being a children’s camp nurse is especially fulfilling to Rebecca.

“Many of the children at camp don’t have enough people in their lives who care about them. Something as simple as a Band-Aid for a skinned knee may be the only kindness they have been shown in a long time. Seeing these children come back each year and watching them grow is amazing. They come back to see me even if they don’t need a nurse. They just need someone who cares,” she shared.

Rebecca also uses her passion for education to help families. Several times a year Rebecca, along with her husband, teach a marriage enrichment series to couples who want to improve their relationships. Some of the couples are newly married while others have been married for years.

“We integrate our past experiences, both good and bad, to help other couples make positive changes in their relationships,” she explained.

Hobbies are another great way to incorporate volunteerism into your day-to-day life. Rebecca learned to crochet before she could read, and it has been a lifelong self-care technique. She crochets blankets and hats for local people experiencing homelessness so they can stay warm during the winter.

How Can You Get Involved?

For the volunteer, benefits come from the social connection gained. Over time, this connection also improves mental health. Volunteers may find themselves feeling less lonely and having a better sense of purpose as they spend more time focused on the needs of others. For many, even helping with a small task makes a significant difference to one’s sense of impact.

Following are some examples of how NPDS can utilize their NPD DNA characteristics in volunteerism:

1. Inquire with your organization’s community outreach department or your local health department about a schedule of local events. As nurses, we can easily leverage our clinical training to assist in community events such as blood drives, cardiac screenings, sports events, and activities for people with disabilities. Consider starting with the Red Cross or Special Olympics.
2. Utilize your knowledge of education theory, instructional modalities, and engagement skills to volunteer to provide faith-based instruction, lead a scout troop, host fundraising events, or tutor. Consider exploring opportunities with Learn To Be Tutoring or Cub Scouts.
3. Take your team skills outside of work to help support climate solutions, serve at a food bank, or build a home. Find local opportunities through  Volunteer.gov and Feeding America.
4. Turn a hobby into something that can help someone else, such as cooking lasagna for families facing hunger, knitting hats for babies, or cycling to raise money for a cause that is meaningful to you. Look into Lasagna Love or Knots of Love.
5. Finally, turn your passion and expertise in NPD into advancing our specialty practice by volunteering with ANPD. Join a committee, taskforce, or work group, answer the call for content matter experts, or apply to sit on the Board of Directors. Keep your eye out for ways to volunteer throughout the year.

This National Volunteer Month, we want to take the opportunity to thank our volunteers for their time, input, work, and passion given to ANPD and our members. We hope your contributions help fuel your why as much as they help the NPD community grow in numbers and impact. If you do not currently volunteer, we hope you are inspired to use any time and resources that you may have support your local community and networks. If you are a volunteer for a cause, we challenge you to encourage a colleague to volunteer with you. Together, we can achieve shared goals and visions. We appreciate you!