Volunteers

If you are planning a large-scale event, or reaching out to homebound survivors, recruiting and training volunteers will be an important part of your campaign. The volunteers will assist survivors and others to complete Pages of Testimony, either at a designated place and time, or in their homes.

There may be an organization in your area with a volunteer corps that you can partner with, such as a local youth group, college students or Jewish Family Services Agency. You can also ask your friends and family to help survivors fill out Pages of Testimony.

Tip: familiarize yourself with the Database so you will feel confident presenting it to others.

We have prepared a Pages of Testimony tutorial video to be screened at volunteer training sessions. (To download video click here.)

We recommend holding at least one training session for 2-3 hours to present the project to volunteers. Demonstrate how to search the online Database and submit additional names on Pages of Testimony.

Steps for working with volunteers:

• Place the Call For Volunteers in your local paper, newsletter, synagogue or bulletin
• Send volunteers an Invitation to a Volunteer Training Session
• Hold a training session and register volunteers
• Compile a list of testifiers (survivors and others)
• Invite survivors to a Names Recovery Event or inform them that a volunteer will be contacting them to set up an appointment to meet
• Contact volunteers to assign them to the survivors they will be working with

After the volunteers submit the Pages of Testimony they collected, check if the names submitted are already in the Database, fill out the Page of Testimony Log, attach it to the Pages and send them in bulk to Yad Vashem’s Hall of Names.

Training session Agenda

For this session we recommend: one or more computers and an overhead projector.

• Names Recovery Campaign history and rationale.
• How to work with Survivors.
• Searching the Online Database of Shoah Victims' Names.
• Submitting Pages of Testimony Online via the Database.
• Filling out physical Page of Testimony forms.
• Questions about the Database (see Database FAQs).
• Have two volunteers act out the following steps for the benefit of the group: call a survivor, introduce the project, make an appointment and help a survivor fill out a Page of Testimony form.
• Questions and answers.
• Review and hand out these TOOLS: Blank Page of Testimony, Completed Page of Testimony, Volunteer Registration Form, Project Talking Points, Working with Survivors.