Silver Cord Opportunities
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Several opportunities arise during the year for Northwest High School students to be able to volunteer for silver cord hours.
During students’ NWHS freshman year, they get the chance to start logging hours for Silver Cord. Silver Cord is a Waukee Community School District (WCSD) program where students can volunteer for non-profit organizations. By April 30th of the student’s senior year, they must have 175 volunteer hours recorded to earn a cord for graduation. However, completing Silver Cord hours goes way beyond earning a cord.
Silver Cord program supervisor Kathy O’Brien stated, “When you take a look at the world, there’s a great need for volunteer service. Learning to volunteer and serve others is a wonderful thing. If those nonprofit organizations didn’t have a Silver Cord program, they would be working very hard to try to get adult volunteers to help run their organizations.”
Many non-profit organizations need help throughout the year, especially in the winter. Many organizations are looking for people to volunteer and help families in need during this holiday season. Simply helping out at the Waukee food pantry by helping sort and package food could go a long way. The Single Parent Provision is another great organization to volunteer at during the holiday season. There are many opportunities to help kids by helping them wrap and find presents for their parents.
O’Brien expressed, “There are lots of opportunities that happen over the holiday season because so many people are in need over the holiday seasons, not only for food but for gifts for their children, because it’s cold, [or] for a place to even lay their head. The chances for volunteer opportunities through the holiday season are coming in every day.”
Volunteering is additionally needed at the school as well. In the fall, students can sign up to coach or referee football for the younger kids in the district. Many NWHS students also enjoy going to elementary schools and helping out teachers with their one of many tasks. All year around there are a multitude of different concessions students can work at for different sports including football, volleyball, track and field, basketball and more.
Aniston Clayton, a senior at NWHS said, “Another good thing about the winter is there [are] concession stands here at Northwest, which is a very good way to get Silver Cord because you are working at your school. It’s just a good way to help out your sports teams here.”
Students trying to find ways to volunteer need to make sure they find something they enjoy doing, which is essential to being successful in completing all of the Silver Cord hours. Many students tend to procrastinate volunteering when they are not passionate or having fun while volunteering. A good way of finding volunteer opportunities that interest you is on the Silver Cord website accessed by the WCSD website. Another good way to find non-profit organizations that you would be interested in is to think about what you want to be when you are older. Many students who want to be in the medical field volunteer at hospitals, not only is that something they have an interest in but it looks great on their college resume.
Sophomore Anisha Choudhary said, “If you want to work with youth, specifically, if you want to work in arts, you can volunteer. If you’re into theater and stuff like that, you can volunteer at the Civic Center and the Playhouse and those kinds of things downtown. So there’s a lot of different options that you should be able to find something that you enjoy doing.”
Whether a student wants a good resume for their future careers or is passionate about truly helping others and non-profit organizations Silver Cord provides great opportunities for everyone.