If you want to notify volunteers about activities, and get them to sign-up; if you want to track how many and which volunteers are working on a specific activity; or if you want to know how many hours were worked at an event or on a program (e.g. Classroom Mentors) you will want to use opportunities.
You can create any number of opportunities for your school. Opportunities can be used for a single event, such as a book fair, or for a program that runs all year long, like lunchroom volunteers.
Adding Opportunities
To set-up an opportunity go to your Opportunities Module and click the Add Opportunity button at the top of the page. This will display a page with several sections that you will need to complete to set-up your opportunity.
In the top section you can specify the following General Settings -
Available All - This will make this opportunity appear on the Available Opportunities page for any volunteer who signs into their account and goes to Volunteer > Opportunities. From there they can sign-up for the opportunity.
Match All - This will sign-up all your active volunteers to this opportunity. This option can be useful when you want all volunteers to see this opportunity and record hours to it without actually having to sign-up first. An example might be ‘campus beautification’ where you want to track volunteer hours on this activity without going to the added step of notifying and signing volunteers up.
Display Kiosk - This option will cause the opportunity to appear on the EZVKiosk after a volunteer signs-in to the kiosk. The opportunity will appear for all volunteers at the kiosk, and if selected they will automatically be signed up and their hours recorded to that opportunity for the day.
Volunteers Needed/Matched/Logged - These display the number of volunteers you are seeking for this opportunity. By default this is set to 999, which means all volunteers can sign-up. If you type a different number, EZVolunteer will limit the sign-up to no more than the number you need. The Matched and Logged fields are links to view the number of matched volunteers on this opportunity and the number of hours logged.
In addition to these basic settings you should type the NAME of the opportunity, the type or category of the opportunity, along with the location of the activity and a description. If you will be using the communication functions of ‘Notifying’ about the Opportunity, be sure to give full details in the description, as the templates will draw from these fields. Location is often the campus front-office, but in cases where you want volunteers to assemble at a different place make certain to include an address or description (band hall, football concession stand, etc.)
The next section is the Schedule for the opportunity. If you are creating a one-time event the simply choose the Start & End date and time and move the next section.
If you want to create a recurring activity, check the ‘This is a recurring opportunity’ box and fill-out the schedule for the activity. For recurring opportunities the initial Start/End Time is the ‘first occurrence’ of the sequence. You can choose a recurrence pattern, such as ‘daily’, ‘weekly’, etc., and the range of recurrence or end date.
Finally, you can choose to add the opportunity to your EZVolunteer calendar. This option will display a list of event categories and you can select which to add this opportunity. Once you select an event category and save this opportunity it will display on your calendar and volunteers can view the details and sign-up for the opportunity from there.
After the schedule you can Assign Coordinators to your opportunity. For someone to be an opportunity coordinator they must first be a registered volunteer and on your school’s Volunteer List. Click the ‘Assign Coordinators’ button to see your list and select the person or people who will serve as coordinators for this event.
The coordinator’s name(s) and contact details will appear with the opportunity when you notify volunteers, or when they sign-up from their account. Once selected you can also specify whether the coordinator(s) will be notified whenever a new volunteer signs up for this opportunity. It’s a great way to keep them informed about who to expect to show up.
The AUTO Settings section can largely be left as is, until you close out your opportunity or unless you have much more advanced requirements when it comes to matching volunteers to this opportunity. If you want to ‘pre-approve’ a volunteer before letting them sign-up simply uncheck the Auto-Match option and volunteers who sign-up will be set to pending, until you accept and match them manually to the opportunity.
The final section is the Thank You Page Settings. Here you can customize the wording that appears on a thank you page when a volunteer signs up to this opportunity. It can be useful to include any other instructions that only pertain to volunteers who are participating in the event.
In addition to giving them further instructions you can add a link to a shift sign-up page on your website, or you can create and use a Shift Form from our Forms Module. This form is linked to the thank you page and volunteers are redirected to the form to choose an individual shift for which they can work. Shift forms can include options that are limited to a fixed number of responses, so if you only want 5 people per shift for three shifts you can limit to the first 5 who complete the form.
Once you finish filling out the details of your opportunity you can use the SAVE button to save your settings and continue editing. The FINISH button will SAVE and return to your list of opportunities. The NEW button saves this opportunity and brings up a blank form, with the assumption you want to create another opportunity.
After saving an opportunity you can go back in and editing the settings or you can use COPY OPP to make a copy of the opportunity if you have another with very similar settings.