Sarah Broomfield,
Outreach volunteer (25)
While searching for fruitful and satisfying employment I came across an advert for Outreach volunteers. Since leaving university and having to actually work for a living (shudder), I hadn’t had the chance to get involved in voluntary work for a while. I had been a supporter of Oxfam for several years and the opportunity to get more involved in their campaigns was very appealing to me. So I signed up.
I am a pretty outgoing person, so I was surprised to find myself a little nervous when the training session came around. I needn’t have been, as everyone there was incredibly welcoming and all the other volunteers were friendly, chatty and interested in what had brought you there.
Doing Outreach has been a fantastic experience. I have learnt so much more about important issues that interest me, have met some really interesting people from all over the world and been to some fantastic events to boot. My role generally entails approaching the public or working the stalls and talking to people about Oxfam’s campaigns, making them aware of issues and asking for their support through petitions and awareness. Mostly I’ve worked on the Control Arms and Make Trade Fair Campaigns.
So far I have campaigned at Respect Festival, V Festival, Carnival, The European Social Forum and the REM gig at Hammersmith Apollo. It’s been a hectic and totally fulfilling year. I think that the idea of attending events for free is appealing to most people but what I would confidently say is that if you join Outreach, you will realise there is so much more satisfaction to be gained from being involved in the important work that Oxfam does, and helping to implement changes in issues that affect us all. When Jack Straw announced his support for an Arms Trade Treaty, or when we collected over 700 sign-ups in just three hours at the REM gig, it gave me a real sense of achievement. Campaigning for Oxfam makes you feel pro-active as well as being immense fun! I hope to be outreaching well into the future…
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