1. Select a position from these internship positions or volunteer positions below.

2. Fill out our application

3. Wait to hear back from us.

Once we receive your completed application you will receive a Welcome Letter and be contacted by our Staff to explore Volunteer Roles within our agency.  At that time we will let you know what job specific training is involved and what Additional Forms may be required. 

Local Jobs for Volunteers
(Oregon and Washington) ADMINISTRATIVE SUPPORT ROLES

Submission Team
We send nearly 700 home studies each month to various caseworkers for families who are waiting to be selected. To do this it takes many volunteer hours from people who can pay attention to detail and are able to email and attach files. This position takes someone who is able to come to our office and can range anywhere from 5 to 20 hours a week, depending on your availability. While this work takes a lot of time it is highly rewarding, especially when you get to see a family chosen for a child!

Office Assistant
Various duties may include filing, answering phone calls, sending and receiving faxes, data entry, making copies, scanning and uploading documents, reference checking, creating forms and other as needed.

Appreciation Coordinator
Do the important work, sends thank-you's to our sponsors/donors/supporters, birthday cards and gifts if possible to our kids, recognizes volunteer’s birthdays and work effort and so on.  These can be set up to trigger you when a thank-you is needed, this work can be done from our office or your home.

FAMILY FINDING PROGRAM VOLUNTEERS

Volunteers are needed to help reconnect foster children with those they love and those who have loved them.
The Family Finding model offers methods and strategies to locate and engage relatives of children living in foster care. The goal of Family Finding is to provide each child with the lifelong connections that only a family can offer. Family Finding volunteers work closely with caseworkers. They perform file mining, make phone calls, and search the internet for relatives or other meaningful people in the child’s life. While each case is different, the typical case takes approximately three months to complete, and 5-10 hours a month in phone calls and research.
If you like playing detective, than this is the position for you! Most roles can be performed anywhere; nationwide. All training is provided for local and nationwide volunteers.

Family Finding volunteers work closely with caseworkers and the Family Finding Director. They perform file mining, make phone calls, and search the internet for relatives or other meaningful people in the child's life. While each case is different, the typical case takes approximately three months to complete, and approximately 5-10 hours a month in phone calls and research. All training is provided. This volunteer can be located anywhere nationwide.
All volunteers will be requested to pass a background check before being given access to sensitive case files.
A Family Finding Volunteer position will be a rewarding opportunity for individuals who possess skills such as:

• Good phone skills. Do you enjoy speaking with new people and asking for information?
• Internet investigative skills. With our training, you will learn how to leave no stone unturned to discover contacts for waiting children.
• Adoptive or foster parents can offer valuable insights to benefit deserving children.
• Excellent follow-up skills. Be the one who made a commitment to a child.
• Detail Oriented–Do you have the skills to pick up on details that others might miss?
• Sense of urgency. Every child in our program has an immediate need to connect with family.

Follow-up volunteer: This volunteer follows up on cases after the children have been reconnected with their loved ones. Follow-ups consist of phone calls and data entry. Follow-ups are made in 3, 6, 9, and 12 month intervals. All training is provided. This volunteer can be located anywhere nationwide.

Family Finding Expert needed to learn and perform Genograms; our Family Tree project for our Family Finding Cases. We supply the software and need a volunteer, local or nationwide to learn the program and use it to complete a family tree project for a child.

Family Finding Department Support
flexible number of hours a week. The Family Finding Department needs a volunteer that can become familiar with the Family Finding process to assist with administrative projects. This is an ideal opportunity for a volunteer that is detailed oriented and enjoys a variety of tasks. This individual would assist with general administrative functions as well as take on tasks such as:
∗ Prepare materials for training sessions.
∗ Coordinate incoming volunteers.
∗ Build family trees with GenoPro software.
∗ Update blogs.
∗ Research family finding best practices.

Family Finding Volunteers
To Work Cases--How you can get involved:
∗ Join a search team
∗ Work closely with caseworkers
∗ Make phone calls
∗ Build family trees
∗ Search the internet for lost relatives
∗ Create positive supportive family connections for isolated foster children Please let us know if you are interested, and we can get you involved in this very innovative way to not only get kids out of foster care but reconnect them to lost loved ones. We would be happy to provide you with more detailed information and to answer any of your questions.

Please contact:
Caitlin Baird
(541) 343-2856 | FAX (541) 343-2866
famfind@afamilyforeverychild.org

MATCHING ASSISTANCE PROGRAM

Volunteer Coordinator and Trainer
Contact, process and train the Volunteers that come to this program.  This involved emailing, connecting, checking references, setting up training and following up. 

Family Adoption Specialist:

• As a Family Adoption Specialist you will be a representative for A Family For Every Child while working with families through the adoption process. You will need to be supportive, empathetic, diligent, and proactive during this time. You can expect to help answer questions for these families, communicate with other agencies about children, as well as communicate with our Matching Assistance Director weekly.

  Responsibilities

  • Support your families through their adoption journey. Stay in contact with your families regularly; check-in with your families via phone at least once a week.
  • Send complete National Child Searches to assigned families twice a month.
  • Be available to help answer questions about the adoption process including promotion, submission, selection, and placement.
  • Provide suggesions for ways to improve their family biography and encourage participation in our recruitment services.
  • Help your families become their own advocate during the process.
  • Alert families to matching events in their state or online webinars to further their education.
  • Send families' biographies to Wendy's Wonderful Kids recruiters in their state and surrounding states.
  • Obtain caseworker contact information as required.
  • Follow up with caseworkers on your families' submissions bi-weekly.
  • Communicate with children's caseworkers and families' adoption workers as required.
  • Keep family data updated and complete.
  • Other tasks as required.

  Qualifications:

  • Customer service experience preferred.
  • Experience with adoption preferred, but not required.
  • Excellent oral and written communication skills, with the ability to communicate with diverse populations.
  • Computer skills with proficiency in Microsoft Word and the Internet.
  • Salesforce experience is preferred, but not required.
  • The ability to access email through Outlook, Webmail, or another email host.
  • Complete work in a timely manner.
  • Supportive, empathetic, diligent and proactive.

  Schedule:

  • Three-month minimum commitment required
  • Initial phone call with introductions and discussion of family child preferences
  • Weekly contact with families via phone and email
  • Bi-weekly contact with children's caseworkers via phone and email
  • Weekly updates to Matching Assistance Director

  Training is provided. Please contact:
  Jenell Koelblin
  matching@afamilyforeverychild.org
  (541)343-2856

Web Page/writing Volunteer
Research, write and compile info for us to link and paste on our Web pages, especially those on the Log on site that have “coming soon” on them.

Web Process Volunteer
Signing on to our new log on site and acting as a family, writing script and suggestions that will help our site be more user friendly for families. Help to create Web forms and other ways to assist families. Help to develop RSS feed tools, Twitter feeds and other ways families can get immediate info on children they are interested in adopting.

Newsletter Volunteer
3 newsletters a week, 1-2 hours a newsletter
Using our outreach tool-Constant Contact-build templates for newsletters and outreach tools. Create 3 newsletters a week as well odds and ends announcements and email outreach for recruitment. (Possible Newsletter themes—Kids in need—Resources—Sites to visit – Articles and updates on adoption.

Matching Admin. Volunteer
Any number of hours a week to assist with foundational support for the program and Director.
Help creating a program process binder, filing, data entry, outreach, faxing, scanning, creating check lists, helping with processes, Researching current programs in place in other states , Create materials and forms needed, reviewing families to make sure all time lines are being met and all material is current and effective.

Program outreach-National
Send our flyers, emails, materials to promote the Matching assistance program, link partner sites, share hour message about the program with Agencies, Adoption workers, Parent groups and Potential parent.

Research Volunteer—
Researching training, articles, support, state-by-state info for our web, family support materials and notebooks, newsletters and etc…

Assess/Evaluate Families Readiness-
2-3 hours per family
Evaluate a families registration with the program, evaluate their home study, recommend needed items to add or build into their bio page, evaluate for up to date, make recommendations on when and what to do to stay current and competitive.

Survey & Evaluation Volunteer-
Outreach to our families, how can we do more? What is most helpful? What is not? Survey and check in with families to help us improve our program

Scholarship program-
Project-help us build and run a Scholarship program for families that can’t afford the monthly fee

Matching assistance Blog- Form, Bulletin board-Help us develop information sharing tools for our log on matching assistance program.

Family Outreach Specialist - Local or National

Using our on line newsletter tools you will send out Feature
E-mails of all our families to Children's Case Workers and
recruiters all over the country. This is a wonderful opportunity
to help assist families and waiting foster children connect.
Most Case Workers are searching for families and our
newsletter is a wonderful resource to assist them in finding
homes for the children they work with. ADOPTION AGENCY

• A Volunteer or an intern to Line up speakers for Support Group Meetings; therapists, DHS Topics, attorney, DYS, speakers for different topics, aged out youth, successful adoptive families, successful adoptees, etc…………
  This person would outreach to local resources, schedule times that a representative would be willing to present at our support group meetings. And do follow up emails

• Create Webinars – for families to use at each step in the process; How to create a lifebook, how to create a autobiography, how to create a useful parenting plan/safety plan, tips for a successful transition, etc. ………This could also be done by an intern.
• A volunteer or an Intern that could create a safety plan with the families, some one that could read the child evaluations, identify the behaviors or challenges of the child/children and help the family create an acceptable safety plan.
• Newsletter writer – someone who has been down the adoption journey, that could put together the Adoption Agency Newsletters and find articles helpful to adoptive families.
• Volunteer or Intern that could work on completing the family process manual adding to it and adding to the web as well.
• Adoption Mentors – those who have adopted from foster care who would be willing to mentor those in the process of adopting
• Someone that could build a support group in the Portland area
• Someone to use technology to video conference for the support groups - those in other areas could join in the topics they choose

Foster Support Meeting Volunteer
Family building support program-local.  Twice a month we hold meetings at Boys and Girls Club for current foster families. We would love to have one or two volunteers that would commit to spending time with the kids while their foster parents are in support meetings. It would be ideal to have college age volunteers who are willing to play with and support these kids. The meetings are generally two hours and are on every other Thursday evening.   

Mini Fundraising Events
Someone who would be willing to create a Run/Walk event (to raise money and for awareness)
Someone who would be willing to set up a Bowl-a-thon (to raise money and for awareness)
Someone that could set up a benefit concert in the park (to raise money and for awareness)
Someone to set up a Wine social at one of the local wineries (to raise money and for awareness)
Someone who could set up a mystery dinner or comedy dinner show (to raise money and for awareness).
 
Party Planner for a kid friendly support group
This would be finding a location for kids to meet and discuss their needs and issues regarding adoption and assimilating into their new family. We hope to get kid friendly location, but, still able to meet quietly as well, to donate their locations or some food for these once a month group meetings.
 
Training's- Perhaps you have the ability to Train or hold a class in something that may benefit a new adoptive family or one just starting the process. Think outside the box, perhaps you could hold a class on Scrap booking as part of the child's Welcome home album, or Life book. Perhaps you have a special skill in

FAMILY BUILDING PROGRAM

Foster Support Meeting Volunteer
Support Group for kids-Family building support program-local.
Twice a month we hold meetings at Boys and Girls Aide for current foster families. We would love to have one or two volunteers that would commit to spending time with the kids while their foster parents are in support meetings. It would be ideal to have college age volunteers who are willing to play with and support these kids. The meetings are generally two hours and are on every other Thursday evening.

Family Building Program Coordinator
This position would include:        

• Organize the yearly Calendar of meetings
• Line up speakers for the Family Building Trainings
• Research, document and contact services and resources for families
• Make above information available on the AFFEC website
• Trainings/support by county, and states, list on AFFEC website
• Manage the Family Building email outreach through Constant Contacts

More Family Building
We are always looking for dedicated folks to work on our Family Building program, we have the opportunity to impact, the pre adopt drop off rate of families starting out and the post adoption disruption rate of kids and families after placement. We are exploring different ways to support and train families, we have many ideas and volunteers but need a few good over-seers.

• Within this Program we have different area's that can be coordinated by different people that will work as a team:
• Kids Support Group
• Waiting Training's for Families
• Meet and Greet Coordinator
• Recruiting families and Mentor Families
• Developing Support Groups for Families
• Researching Services available to Families for us to put on our web site.
• Researching information about Subsidies available in the state of Oregon for the web site.
• video or power point

• Researching current programs in place in other parts of the state (also, DHS program)
• Designing the program
• Creating a Process Binder (so the program could be duplicated in other parts of the state)
• Create all materials and forms needed
• Background check process and get clearance
• Develop training
• Develop recruitment process
• Develop marketing materials and avenues of distribution

• Starting a new Heart Gallery
• Recruiting photographers
• Building Media connections
• Bringing Case workers on board to photo list their kids
• Gathering Support information for your state, county by county or city by city that we will then put on the web.
• Linking our web site with partners
• Reaching out to agencies to build relationships to help their families with our Matching Assistance Program
• Recruiting Volunteers
• Blogging about us
• Gathering email addresses for our newsletter list, this is often the first way we engage people and educate them in who we are.
• Grants/RFP's/Funding Opportunities
• Assisting other efforts/Heart Galleries/agencies in the state that we can in any way
• Any info for our web site from News Feed info about your state to child listing to support, new efforts and so on.

Any number of hours can be spent, we can either train you on our system to enter state information or you can keep a record on your own and we will do the data entry. We offer support daily as you move through this role and discover new ways we can partner. We encourage "outside the box" thinking and are open to all partnership ideas. We will provide you with letters, linking templates, sponsor flyers, brochures, whatever you need.

WEB SITE/WORK

Logo/Linking Partner volunteerWe are only as strong as our searches, so to drive traffic to us we need to be linked from as many web sites/partners as we can. We have a template and logo that we give our outreach volunteers to use to help us increase the web hits and, therefore, families. This volunteer can live anywhere in any state, all work is done on the web/email. If you would like to be involved in this effort or have web sites/businesses or partners you would like to suggest, please email info@afamilyforeverychild.org. It truly takes a Village, and we need you!

Web Editor:
Skills required:
HTML/CSS/Javascript/Dreamweaver
Duties:
Maintain the various news feeds on the websites, the events page, calendar page.
Work with the web team who does the large edits while performing the small changes and uploads.
Proofread to see that the feeds show as desired.
Get daily input from google, childwelfare.gov, cherry pick relevant content for our website.
Featured Child, Featured Family, updates to the front page, keep up with relevant developments internal to AFFEC.

SEO Expert:
Skills required:
SEO, careful record keeping, HTML/CSS/Dreamweaver
Duties:
Locate sites which would have an interest or a need to reference us in their website.
(use Google keywords to do this over the first 40 pages of hits).
Supply lists of sites to the web team, who will send them templated letters.
Check lists to make sure we are not repeatedly asking the same sites to list us.
Adjust google adwords according to hit rates.

Web Programmer
Skills Required
HTML/CSS/Javascript/PHP/MySQLi/Dreamweaver
Duties:
Team work with web coordinator to make site improvements in functionality.
Document work so that it can be understood by other web programmers.
Design, code, test, implement, and release bug fixes.
Design, code, test, implement, and release major site functionality upgrades.National Web Site Outreach-Heart Gallery of America website-Develop list of Specialty Agencies Nations wide-Developing relationships with other photo listings for our children.

Web Bio Writers

National or Local
We are looking for volunteer Child web bio's. It can be a skill taking the history and needs of a child and putting them in a form that gives the family as much appropriate information as possible. We have noticed a good writer can do a lot for these kids. This volunteer doesn't need to be local and could be handled through email. Little training is involved, but you will need to complete our volunteer and confidentiality forms.

Other Web Volunteer—

• Email newsletters
• Resizing images
• Proofing web pages
• Building resources/training and links for our web page
• Writing bio’s
• Working on our web page—building more web pages, enhancing what we already have.
• Building Web forms
• Build Spanish pages
• Writing Help text for the web
• Private site
• Develop a widget
• Expand Volunteer and Employment area
• Social media/Press page volunteer
• Widget volunteer
• Web Help Text Volunteer

HEART GALLERY

Heart Gallery Local Coordinator
We are looking for a Volunteer Heart Gallery Coordinator to work from our Eugene/Springfield office. The Heart Gallery is a portrait exhibit displayed to raise awareness of the needs of foster children who are waiting and hoping for their own adoptive family to love and protect them. Professional photographers volunteer to take compelling portraits and these beautifully framed and matted portraits get displayed along with the children's biographies in various venues that will touch your heart. We are looking for a volunteer Heart Gallery Coordinator to work with our Heart Gallery Director. This will involve:

• Monthly Portrait orders
• Putting together update (image & bio) packets for our volunteer to pick up and update their venues
• Some outreach to new venues
• Coordinating Venue Volunteers
• Being part of our team to grow and brainstorm new ways to create visibility for the Heart Gallery

This position is 5-10 hours a week depending on the time of month (the beginning of the month and/or last week of the month are when most update work is done). We hope you will consider joining our Team! The Heart Gallery is our Landmark program and we are very proud of what has been done and hope to do much more!

Photo – Videographer Coordinator-Local
Our Heart Gallery needs someone who can come in approximately 5 hours a week and help coordinate our Venue Photo Packets, connect with and process Photographers from all over the state as well as nationwide. Someone who can do outreach and connect with Photographers -scheduling photo sessions, following up and processing images once completed.

Venue volunteers- program (Heart Gallery) local, WA & OR
Would you enjoy driving around town and spend just a few hours a month going to our venues and swapping out photographs of children? You may have seen these around the area (if you reside in Oregon). We display photos of available and waiting children with bio information in restaurants, doctors and dentist's offices, airports, grocery stores and the like. All photos and needs are supplied by our organization. This basically consists of picking up your new photos, going to the venue and updating the displays.

Heart Gallery Expansion Coordinator
This position would include:

• Statewide outreach for Photographers and Videographers
• Statewide outreach for possible gallery venues/vendors/volunteers, etc
• Statewide outreach for resources (printing, frames, brochure holders, easels, banners, etc)
• Assist in organization of storage (photos, frames, matt board, supplies, etc) to create sample for other sites
• Document gallery set-up, storage of equipment, etc with photos/video to be used as samples
• Research, outreach and record data, on Heart Galleries across the country

• We have started a Business Advocate effort--Where we are offering business the opportunity to high light a child in their place of business, on an easel, or as a window display to do some specific recruitment for the harder to place children. I have one person that is working on this, but, can see (because of the immediate interest) that she could use a partner. It is a creative way of displaying children. We have VRC, GATEWAY, and 5 Th Street Market committed to Window space, hopefully on an ongoing moving basis. So if you have a creative, artsy flare, this might be your strength .
• This would involve doing outreach to business all over the state, seeking sponsored venues, getting them started and linking our web sites, then passing them off to a venue volunteer to maintain.

• Scheduling exhibits for our yearly on going Faith-Based Heart Gallery calendar
• Sending letters to prospective faith-based sites
• Coordinating site set-up prior to exhibits
• Helping with exhibit set-up
• Maintaining brochure inventory
• Following up with sites after an exhibit (thank you letter, rescheduling for next year, etc)
• Soliciting donations for needed supplies (frames, easels, picture stands, brochure holders, etc)
• Data-entry of all of the above
• Creation of a Process Binder for all of the above (so we can duplicate this program in other parts of the state)

• 2-3 hours per week (Sundays)
  Our Heart Gallery photos are on display each month at a different local church. Sunday morning greeters are needed to attend the display where the display is showing. Duties include: directing viewers to the Heart Gallery literature, making sure the exhibit is in good order, and noting any questions to be passed on to AFFEC employees, etc.

Easel Builders—We are always in need of new Easels for our venues.

Frame repair and/or collecting Frames for our venues at Garage Sales and other sources.

Creative Photo display-We have some wonderful photo pieces that include the photo and child's bio all in one frame and we would love to have these duplicated for variety in our Heart Gallery exhibits. This could be an on-going project.

FOSTER TO ADOPT-MENTOR FOSTER TO ADOPT

Mentor-Foster-to-Adopt Program Coordinator
This position would include: Helping us create this program and all materials, web presents, forms, outreach needed.  Some areas of possible task are below:

• Developing and documenting a process
• Creating a Program Process Binder (so the program can be duplicated in other parts of the state)
• Coordinating email outreach (in Constant Contacts)
• Uploading information on AFFEC website
• Bi-Monthly Recruitment Flyer
• Sales force Database Management
• Finding stock photos for website and writing and recording Child Bios
• Status updates
•  

MENTOR PROGRAM

Mentor Program Volunteer
We would like to recruit a volunteer for the mentor program that can go to different venues/businesses and try to get free tickets for activities for our mentors to use with their mentees. Also would like that person to be able to find free family activities that are available this summer. Some of our mentors have expressed their concern about not having the funds to do extra things with the kids that they would like to do.

Mentor - Spanish Speaking
Do you speak Spanish and love kids? We are looking for male mentors to mentor children who speak fluent English but whose parents have limited English. Use your gifts of language to make a difference in a child’s life.

Mentor Program Coordinator
This position would include:

• Data Entry Management for e-mails and monthly reports in Sales force
• Assist in generating statistics/reports for families and children in our database
• Participate and implement volunteer orientation and training sessions
• Complete reference checks
• Develop new relationships with groups that are potential sources of volunteers.
• Soliciting donations for needed supplies (paper, printing supplies, folders, etc)

Legislator/politician Outreach
Because we are a 501c we cannot indorse or back any one policing. But, we think it would be in our favor to have a volunteer that is reaching out to likeminded politicians, obtaining their emails for our newsletters and educating them on whom we are. Also, educating themselves on the different issues and people that we need to be connected to in this realm. Someone that has an interest in politics and legislator would be a natural fit.  This could be for Oregon and Nationally.
General Awareness Campaign "Why Not Me"—This is a general awareness and education campaign, involving media, social media, in person venues, traditional media and more.  Could be a smaller traveling display that we are hoping to have circulate the community at different festivals, conventions, and small venues. We need people to man booths as well as someone to coordinate this effort.
This can also include many other kinds of "Why Not Me" outreach, such as, billboards, bus sides, sports field signs, lawn signs, posters and so on!  Unlimited area and possibilities.