I love volunteering at Children’s Health just because I get to see how what I’m doing is making a difference. It’s a positive experience, it’s fun. What’s started the volunteer program here, it really helped heal my heart. For more than 100 years, Children’s Health has been making life better for children.
Today, with a full range of pediatric health, wellness, and acute care services across two hospitals, multiple specialty centers, twenty primary care practices, and eight Our Children’s House Outpatient Clinics, we’re offering more services to more children in more places than ever before.
And none of it would be possible without the time, talents, and donations of our incredible volunteers. Our adult volunteer program at Children’s offers a variety of roles to serve the children of North Texas. From supporting patients, families, and visitors to helping out the hospital staff.
I am a sitter, so for part of the day while I’m here, I am in and out of the rooms to sit with children, hold babies if they just need to be held, play games with children if they’re by themselves. We get a lot more out of it than we give and you’ll find volunteers saying that a lot.
The mission at Children’s is to make life better for the children and often a baby’s parents can’t be with a baby so NICU volunteers are very important We also offer a program open to students 16 years of age and older interested in serving children in a variety of ways.
Including administrative support, customer service, and family hospitality. The experience helps shape career aspirations and many of our student volunteers actually end up working in health care.
So I’m going to school for speech pathology to be a speech therapist and I figured that this was a great way, you know, to kind of learn a little bit more about the field and also get a chance to work with kids. Along with our student and adult programs, we have a number of leadership organizations: schools, churches, scout troops, and other groups that volunteer.
These teams work together to donate items like toys, food, and handmade blankets, all in an effort to help the children of North Texas and surrounding neighborhoods. Assistance league of Dallas has been around for about a little over 50 years.
A couple of years into it, they formed a relationship with Children’s Health. Our program is called Cheers for Children and I feel like that’s what we do. We work through First Baptist Church of Richardson to make our finger puppets for the children.
And we ship several thousand a quarter to be given out to the children. While individual and group volunteers make a huge impact, pet therapy also has a profound effect on the healing process of children. Dogs in particular help patients feel more at home and at ease during the journey to better health.
In fact, Children’s Health has volunteers that visit children throughout the week through our Pet Smart Paws for Hope Pet Assisted Therapy Program. The partnership with Paws Across Texas and Children’s started in 2001.
The program was established with Children’s to provide a normalcy to the patients that were here. Some dogs come in and they do lots of tricks and that’s that’s their thing and that’s entertaining and fun. And then some dogs like Toby, are just here to, you know, love on you or let you love on them.
Are you ready to make a difference in a child’s life? Volunteer at Children’s Health. Visit our website at childrens.com/volunteers or email Volunteer_Services@childrens.com I have the most fun job at Children’s Health. Well, Children’s is the best place to be and you’ll find it out when you get here.
You really feel like you’re doing something for other people and giving back to the community. It has actually been a very rewarding experience for me. I get as much out of it as I give for sure. I would say to anyone who has a few hours a week to spare, this is the place to be.
