The first book to specifically address the relationship between social work and volunteers, Social Work with Volunteers examines the current shift in social welfare services and the growing need to develop effective partnerships with volunteers. As the primary profession in the development, provision, and evaluation of social services, social workers are in a position to shape how agency administrators, direct staff, and volunteers work together to provide services. Using the groundbreaking Context-Specific Optimal Partnership (CSOP) model, the author demonstrates how social workers in all areas of practice can work with volunteers to create a positive change. Social Work with Volunteers is organized around three basic themes: volunteerism as a complex behavioral and social phenomenon, the historical relationship between social work and volunteers, and the development and application of the CSOP model.

What is virtual volunteering? It’s work done by volunteers online, via computers, smartphones or other hand-held devices, and often from afar. More and more organizations around the world are engaging people who want to contribute their skills via the Internet. The service may be done virtually, but the volunteers are real! In The LAST Virtual Volunteering Guidebook, international volunteerism consultants Jayne Cravens and Susan J. Ellis emphasize that online service should be integrated into an organization’s overall strategy for involving volunteers. They maintain that the basic principles of volunteer management should apply equally to volunteers working online or onsite. Whether you’re tech-savvy or still a newbie in cyberspace, this book will show you how to lead online volunteers successfully by: -Overcoming resistance to online volunteer service and the myths surrounding it; -Designing virtual volunteering assignments, from micro-volunteering to long-term projects, from Web research to working directly with clients via the Internet; -Adding a virtual component to any volunteer’s service; -Interviewing and screening online volunteers; -Managing risk and protecting confidentiality in online interactions; -Creating online communities for volunteers; -Offering orientation and training via Internet tools; -Recruiting new volunteers successfully through the Web and social media; and -Assuring accessibility and diversity among online volunteers. Cravens and Ellis fervently believe that future volunteer management practitioners will automatically incorporate online service into community engagement, making this book the last virtual volunteering guidebook that anyone has to write!