Have you heard about Philadelphia’s new Portal? The interactive art installation connects viewers to other cities with identical portal sculptures, which function as massive public webcams.  Philadelphia’s portal connects to a new city every three minutes, rotating between Vilnius, Lithuania; Lublin, Poland; and Dublin, Ireland. (CLICK HERE to learn more)

Care & Share’s portal is much more important, as it will connect US directly to YOU, our valued volunteer!

Over the next few months, we will introduce a new volunteer portal called VicNet. The first department to try it out is the Book Shoppe’s hub volunteers. VicNet will allow volunteers to view their profile information and adjust their schedules. Volunteers will also receive automated monthly emails with their upcoming schedules. It can be accessed via our website or an app that can be downloaded to your phone. 

Volunteers are not required to use the portal, and the portal will not gather additional information from them. Our Volunteer Department enters all the information that volunteers provide on their initial applications. 

We encourage volunteers to give this new tool a try.  VicNet will also enable us to post open shifts and make it very easy to see where we are fully staffed and where we need help.

In the coming weeks, Maggie Pugliese will be working closely with department managers, training them on how to use VicNet. As managers receive their training, we will roll out the portal in each department. The new Volunteer Portal training will also be given at the upcoming Town Hall on December 2, at 1PM in the North Breakroom. Please plan on attending! Submit any questions beforehand in the “comment” box located in each Breakroom or email Maggie:  mpugliese@caresharethrift.org

Our department managers recently spent some time volunteering at other local nonprofits.  The one common theme we heard was the ease of signing up to volunteer using a portal like VicNet.  We appreciate your patience and understanding as we all become familiar with this program.  Thank you for serving with us at Care & Share.