Hi everybody. I was asked to do a blog for my time as a VO (Volunteer Officer) at BTCV in the Stirling Office. I suppose it’s to guide people wanting to volunteer and to give a more human side to the BTCV volunteer experience.
I guess I should start by telling you a little bit about myself. I’m Kieren, I’m 23 and I’ve been volunteering with the guys in the Stirling office since the 25th of Febuary. (I only know that because today I got a lovely certificate marking my 100th hour of volunteering complete with dates, 25th Feb – 31st March it covered)
So I’m about halfway through a 6 month placement provided by Project Scotland. It means I volunteer for around 30 hours a week and in return get some living allowance money of £55 a week and I get a budget allocated to send me on courses. Check them out if you’re interested in voluteering.
I graduated from Stirling University last year with an Honours degree in Animal Biology and have been trying to find a job in an Environmental field. After more than a few unsuccessful applications and some boring jobs I wasn’t enjoying I decided to quit and volunteer to get that much needed experience for jobs.
Like with anything new I found my first few weeks really hard. I was meeting new people who were trying to gauge where my skills lay and what my character was. I myself wasn’t sure if it’s what I wanted to be doing and didn’t have a clue what I was good at. I tend to be pretty confident but when I’m not comfortable I’m not as chatty or as open as I normally can be. I was even asking questions like if I was trimming the trees correctly.
I reckon this sort of thing might be more common than people let on but I couldn’t have told you the difference between a shovel and a spade, to me they were the same tools. But then why would I know that? I wasn’t exactly a DIY whizz when I started.
Ok so enough about me for now. In the next week or so I’ll try and do a couple of blogs to catch up to the present day, fill in what it was like when I stated.
Till then, keep working hard