Volunteer fair for seniors

Commitment in retirement - senior citizens use volunteer exchange

Ten in the morning in Jena East - Café Lenz is open - coffee and cake are served.

Ten organizations and associations looking for active support from volunteers have transformed the café into an engagement exchange for senior citizens. Current volunteer opportunities and profiles of the organizations and projects present hang on a clothesline. Whether with children, the elderly, club members or the sick, visitors can choose from a wide range of offers to find out how they would like to get involved in the future. The local contact persons provided insights into the possible tasks and volunteers gave information about what is needed for a voluntary commitment and what special moments can be experienced in the respective work. From the telephone counselling service to Tausend Taten e.V. and the AWO multigenerational house in Lobeda: the range is wide and shows how many opportunities there are to get involved in the city of Jena.

Together with the network "Treffpunkt Generationen Jena" (Meeting Point Generations Jena), the Volunteer Agency Jena organized the engagement exchange for the un-/retired. The associations and organizations present praised the event: "It was a really valuable event. There were also several good conversations," reports Christiane Sachse from the East Thuringia telephone counselling service, for example. She and other associations are facing the challenge of recruiting enough volunteers. Therefore, this exchange came in handy. The 35 or so visitors were also satisfied and went home with information material, new ideas and now familiar faces.

The wish for a recurring event was explicitly formulated - of course next time in another part of Jena!