If appropriate for your clinical setting, volunteers can truly enhance the experience children have visiting their pediatricians. Volunteers can read aloud, decorate bulletin boards with literacy rich material, or assist children with educational activities in the waiting area.

The resources below offer limited information about finding volunteers and guidelines for having volunteers. Most large medical institutions have a volunteer office and a process for reviewing applicants. It is always best to follow those guidelines.

Volunteers, however, might not be easily included in the busy and often limited space of a pediatric office waiting area. Children can still benefit from being in a “literacy rich” waiting area or exam room. Please refer to the section on Web Site Sources for Books to find books for your office. In this case, it may be easier to utilize volunteers for “off-site” projects like book drives and fundraisers.

America’s Literacy Directory
A directory of literacy and educational resources that allows the user to type in a city, state, or zip code and a Volunteer Resources tab allows easy access to volunteer organizations and opportunities.

America Reads Challenge
Useful archived material on the legal issues regarding volunteers, including getting and managing them.

Corporation for National & Community Service
The Corporation for National and Community Service offers resources to help you recruit people for your projects, including tools to post your service opportunities online.

ProLiteracy

Verizon Literacy Network
Verizon is dedicated to promoting literacy. As stated on its Web site, “Volunteers are a vital part of the literacy movement, which is building stronger communities across the country by meeting the needs of those with specific literacy challenges.”