Each week for Give Back Thursday, we offer suggestions of ways you can help the community. For this week’s Give Back Thursday, we suggest you Do a Mini Day of Caring! Read on for more details.
Every year, the Grove City Area United Way organizes a Day of Caring in our community. This Annual Day of Caring is a day where the Grove City Area United Way mobilizes volunteers from all across our community to work on projects throughout Grove City. They typically have around 500 volunteers that are sent out to 70-80 project sites. These sites include doing projects for elderly residents, cleaning up local roads and waterways, projects throughout Olde Town and Memorial Park, getting the Community Garden ready for the planting season, prepping our local playgrounds and sports fields for the summer, mulching at the Middle School, and performing needed jobs at local non-profits and area churches.
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and for the safety of everyone involved, the Grove City Area United Way had to make the very difficult decision this year to cancel the Day of Caring. Although it was hard for them to cancel, they knew that several of their project sites were elderly and vulnerable people that had to be protected, along with the hundreds of volunteers. So, while the Annual Day of Caring wasn’t able to happen this year, that doesn’t mean that individuals and families can’t be inspired by this wonderful day and the acts of service to others.
For Give Back Thursday, we hope you are inspired to do your own Mini Day of Caring! You can gather together your family members or small groups of friends. Remember, it is still important to socially distance and put safety measures in place like hand sanitizing, masks where appropriate, and keeping everyone safe. After you figure out if you will be working solo or organizing a small group, decide on your project or projects. You might be inspired to clean up your neighborhood, a certain area in the community, or perhaps you will focus on elderly or vulnerable neighbors or people that you know. If you will be focusing on individuals, make sure to call them and ask if they would be willing to let you help them, and ask if they have a specific project that they could use help with, or if it would be alright for you to just do something you see they need help with. If you can’t think of anything to do, you can reach out to the Grove City Area United Way to see if they are aware of projects that were needed but not able to be completed with the Annual Day of Caring event. No matter what you choose to focus on, it will be a big help to the community at large, because you are helping others, and in the words of the Grove City Area United Way, you are choosing to LIVE UNITED!
When the Grove City Area United Way organizes the Annual Day of Caring, they put a lot of time in to organizing the projects, who will go to the project sites, what supplies will be needed to complete the projects, and so much more. Keep in mind that you will be organizing your project, group, and will need to figure in any supplies that will be needed. Perhaps they will be things you have on hand and can use, or you might need to organize this with the person you are going to help, or maybe as another act of kindness, you will help with any purchases needed. This shouldn’t be expected, but may impact the person you are helping, more than you realize.
If you choose to participate with this Give Back Thursday, and Do a Mini Day of Caring, take photos of your projects, your hard work and fun, and post them on social media. Be sure to tag the Grove City Area United Way and our Chamber, so that we can share your moments and celebrate the kindness being spread throughout the community. You can even use #GCMiniDayofCaring and #LIVE UNITED with your posts. If you have participated in past Annual Day of Caring events with the Grove City Area United Way, you might pull out one of your old Day of Caring t-shirts, and wear that proudly as you do your own Mini Day of Caring. Let’s show we LIVE UNITED and help others!
Contact details for the Grove City Area United Way and other Chamber Member nonprofit organizations who may need help with projects can be found at https://grovecityareachamber.com/member-directory/?cn-s=&cn-cat=79
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