Volunteer Co-ordinator

Since 2013, FarmAbility has been supporting learning disabled and autistic adults and young people in Oxfordshire, running an outdoor day service for co-farmers (our participants), across multiple sites and locations each week. Currently we work with over 65 people each week across 6 regular host sites. Our co-farmers are adults of all ages with learning disabilities and young people from local specialist SEND provision. Many FarmAbility co-farmers are also autistic and/or physically disabled.  We create inclusive, welcoming communities at each location for people to join in and feel part of something meaningful.

We are looking for an enthusiastic and motivated individual to join our dedicated team as our new Volunteer Co-ordinator (VC). The VC will take the lead in recruiting and supporting volunteers across FarmAbility’s host sites. They will help volunteers to effectively fulfil their roles through providing recruitment, induction and supervision support as well as annual access to formal training. They will also take responsibility for: monitoring volunteer numbers and data; effective communications; ensuring that our volunteers feel valued and supported in their roles. The postholder will have experience supporting people with Learning Disabilities and those who are autistic within practical activities and the skills and knowledge to guide our volunteers in their own development. Additionally, the new VC will lead on our new Green Buddies project. This will develop a strand of Supported Volunteering for existing co-farmers, who will benefit from a 1-1 buddy, a person who can support them to access individual environmental/ horticulture volunteering opportunities, with our own projects and with partner organisations around Oxfordshire. This is a funded project and at least 1 day per week will be spent on developing and creating this new opportunity for our co-farmers. The VC will liaise closely with the Programme and Office Administrator, Co-Farmer Outcomes Lead and Programme Leaders about volunteer recruitment, site allocation and priority needs for our day-to-day service and the new project.