MAVA Monthly Member Spotlight: Mikaela Wolf
Staff | Published on 10/6/2021
Name: Mikaela Wolf
Position: Community Engagement Coordinator
Organization: Face to Face Health and Counseling
MAVA Member Since: April 2021
Please describe your volunteer program:
Our volunteer program has undergone many changes as a result of the pandemic. Volunteer opportunities with our programs remain largely on hold out of concern for the clients who utilize our programming and face barriers to receiving the vaccine. This pause in volunteers has given us time to re-evaluate how we can improve our volunteer program and focus on diversifying volunteers to better match the diversity of clients, especially within BIPOC and LGBTQ+ representation.
What is your role?I am primarily responsible for recruiting and engaging with volunteers as well as working with staff to identify volunteer opportunities. I also manage in-kind donations for Face to Face and establish relationships with many community organizations and faith communities.
How did you get involved in Volunteer Management?
Honestly it felt like an accident that all these small events in my life would lead up to this. I was very interested in service-learning courses in high school which led me to a job in college working with service-learning courses on the volunteer management side of things. I enjoyed working with community partners and getting to know more about everyone involved. After graduation I took some time off and when I came back to job searching a friend told me about this position that combined both my experience with volunteer management and an additional interest in fundraising. I’ve really enjoyed learning more about the non-profit world and building relationships with the community.
What does it mean to you to be a MAVA member?
I initially joined MAVA to take part in the VILT training which was very helpful in providing more formal training in volunteer management that I hadn’t had before. I’ve stayed connected to MAVA as I enjoy continually learning from professionals in my field. There always seems to be an educational opportunity, be it a conference or a webinar, right when I’m encountering an issue that I’d like more guidance on. I also love the networking opportunities with other organizations in the state.
Can you recall a time when being a MAVA member directly impacted your work in your organization?
Through joining MAVA’s DEI cohort I’ve been able to work with other organizations and non-profit professionals to improve our volunteer programs. A lot of us have similar goals to diversify our volunteers and it’s been helpful to brainstorm ideas and have additional support from MAVA staff to create resources that provide tangible action steps for improvement.