Civic Engagement in Action : The Volunteer Needs of the Idaho Foodbank and their Partner Agencies  Class: Psyc 489: Capstones Perspectives on Psychology, Spring 2010  Instructor Name: Dr. Linda Anooshian  Community Partner Name: The Idaho Foodbank  Idaho Foodbank Mission Statement: The Idaho Foodbank, in an efficient and caring manner, provides food, information, and supportive services to hungry people through partnerships with nonprofit agencies, the food industry, government, volunteers, corporations, and individuals by serving as a central clearinghouse for donated and purchased food.  Service Project Purpose: To help The Idaho Foodbank identify the volunteer needs of their partner agencies in order to better distribute aid throughout the Treasure Valley and the state of Idaho.  Learning goals: To utilize the skills we have learned through our academic experiences in psychology to improve our community. Reflection This experience helped our group gain a better understanding about the consequences of poverty- related-hunger and how poverty affects people in the state of Idaho. Despite the complications we had with schedules and contacting agencies, we were able to use the skills we have gained throughout our time as psychology majors. We are proud of the database we created and hope that it will continue to be used for the benefit of the Foodbank and its many partner agencies. Lastly, we hope that future Service Learning students will build upon and update our database in the years to come. Method We contacted partner agencies of the Idaho Foodbank Boise-chapter and administered our Volunteer-Needs Survey over the phone. Data was entered directly into Qualtrics by our research team during the survey process. Agencies were asked questions about their volunteer needs and then offered a list of answers to choose from. For each of the 10 questions, multiple answers were allowed to ensure that agencies’ volunteer needs were properly represented by the results. Of our 130 agency-contact numbers, We were able to speak to 80 representatives from various agencies (a 62% response rate). Of the 80 agencies we contacted, 68 agreed to participate while 12 chose not to. Data was collected throughout February and March of Results and Discussion Of the 68 participating agencies, 51% requested volunteer referrals from the Idaho Foodbank. We looked at the answers of these 35 agencies to determine when and what types of volunteers are most desired by partner agencies of the Idaho Foodbank. When asked when they needed volunteer assistance, 37% of the agencies we studied described no preference for which season they needed help in. However, it is important to note that agencies expressed need for more volunteers depended on the season. Winter volunteers were most desired (requested 45% of the time), followed by spring (34%), autumn (31%), and lastly, summer (26%). Ninety-seven percent of agencies that requested help asked for volunteers that could provide routine and unskilled work; along with routine labor, 40% of agencies also requested help in form of skilled labor or for specific events. Future researchers of these and similar agencies should be aware of possible limitations. Non-profit agencies are often overworked and understaffed, so getting a hold of the right person can be a challenge. We found more success when we left messages and made repeat calls to less responsive agencies. Kristin Batten, Jasmina Ceho, Anna Hunt, Taylor Rutledge, Rosemary Stivers Introduction The Idaho Foodbank, the leader in the fight against hunger in Idaho, saw a 15% increase in volunteers from the fiscal year of 2008 (Idaho Foodbank Annual Report, 2009). Volunteer workers are as critical to the success of the Idaho Foodbank’s partner agencies as they are to the Foodbank itself; however, some of these agencies struggle to find reliable volunteers to complete their services. The goal of our research was to determine the volunteer needs of the Idaho Foodbank’s Boise-area partner agencies. This was so any excess volunteers could be properly directed to agencies that would gain the most benefit from their services. This not only benefits the agencies receiving volunteers and more specialized help, but it will also help the Foodbank by reducing the number of volunteers on the waitlist. Reducing waitlists could potentially leave a more positive impact on volunteer attitudes as well. Our research is based on two questions: Are smaller agencies getting the help they need? If not, how do small nonprofit agencies get the help they need?