Last week was National Volunteer Week, Australia’s largest annual celebration of volunteering. A week to recognise and celebrate all volunteers for the important work they do improving society.

When working within a community to make it happier, healthier and kinder, active engagement from local community members is essential. At the Little BIG Foundation, we don’t know where we’d be without the incredible support of our Little BIG Tribe.

Volunteer rates are slowly creeping back up to what they were pre-pandemic, which shows individuals’ desire to re-engage with their community, connect with those around them and give back. Volunteer Australia’s recent webinar ‘Volunteering in Australia Research Early Insights – The Volunteer Perspective’ explained the strong correlation between rates of volunteering and wellbeing. Through volunteering, we experience social connections and a feeling of personal satisfaction that we have contributed to society.

But how do we encourage more people to get out there and volunteer for their community? How do we transform the ‘I will’ into ‘I am’?

Volunteering Australia highlighted the need to brainstorm ways to ease barriers, particularly in relation to work and family commitments. The new way of working has made it easier in some senses to volunteer, with potentially more time available during the day, but harder for traditional volunteering where volunteers need to travel to a specific location.

That’s why we’re narrowing the scope to focus on local. Because together, little actions can have a BIG impact on the wider community.

The Little BIG Foundation has recently launched our volunteer program and it’s been great to see such strong enthusiasm from the community – from getting involved in the program, to connecting with their neighbours.

We’re looking forward to continuing to work with the local community across lots of exciting projects as we grow our Little BIG Tribe. To find out more head to https://littlebigfoundation.org/volunteer/

Little B.I.G. Foundation was founded by and receives ongoing support from EG.