The purpose of this quantitative study was to investigate Penn State Extension 4-H volunteer leaders' leadership development needs and preferred delivery methods for leadership development. The participants were 147 volunteer leaders who attended Penn State Extension Annual 4-H Leader Forum and filled out the survey. We found that the overall mean…

The purpose of this quantitative study was to assess the relationship between volunteer leadership competencies and stewardship action-taking experiences among Master Gardener (MG) and Master Watershed (MW) volunteers during the COVID-19 pandemic. We collected data from 1196 Penn State Extension MG and MW respondents. The mean summative score for…

Volunteer-based organizations are dependent on volunteers to meet the goals of the organization. Identifying and training volunteers as leaders of the organization is one way to increase positive social change in their community. However, there is limited literature investigating the outcomes of providing leadership training to volunteers. This…

From grassroots to mega-event level, the sport sector has long-relied on volunteers to function effectively. While the nature of sport volunteering varies, scholars have identified that volunteerism is built around characteristics (e.g. altruism, civic participation, acquisition of social capital, personal and professional development) that draw…

Transformational philanthropic gifts to American universities have dramatically increased in number, size and scope over the past 20 years. During the past ten years, the proliferation of these gifts, defined in this study as $50 million or more, has been especially profound. While such gifts have become almost commonplace at many elite private…

Community playgroups, which are one type of playgroup and early childhood service, operate on a weekly basis under the leadership of volunteer caregivers (including parents, kinship members, family-day carers and other adults in children's lives). Caregivers and children voluntarily attend and participate in community playgroups. Although…

Columbus, the largest city in Ohio, is an epicenter for several overlapping health disparities, including poverty, food insecurity, and infant mortality. A group of volunteer undergraduate students at The Ohio State University sought to reduce some of these disparities through the creation of ENCompass: Empowering Neighborhoods of Columbus. This…

This article describes how professionals leading volunteers can purposefully work toward developing the "leadership identity" of individual volunteers. These concepts and the application of them are presented in the context of Cooperative Extension volunteer groups. Specific methods of developing the leadership identity and capacity of individual…

Participating in activities such as being involved in school life and practicing leadership skills are as important for immigrant learners as studying English. We surveyed 33 student volunteers and analyzed testimonies of nine staff members to investigate how English as a second language (ESL) student volunteers' engagement and leadership…

Volunteer leaders are an underutilized resource in nonprofit organizations. However, as volunteer directors are stretched to their capacity, others in the organization must provide leadership to volunteers. One way for nonprofit organizations to increase their capacity is to develop the leadership skills of identified volunteer leaders. Because…

To ensure that the science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) workforce of the future is inclusive of diverse peoples and ideas, there is a need to ensure that STEM outreach activities that encourage students into STEM education and careers are inclusive of and provide equity for people from diverse racial/ethnic, socioeconomic, and…

Non-profit and volunteer-based organizations are tasked with meeting the needs of their communities with limited resources. Today, more than ever, these organizations are stretched to their limits increasing the workload for paid staff. Training volunteers to lead the volunteer efforts is one way to spread the workload throughout the organization.…

Museums and disabled people can create co-designed spaces that lead to a more authentic agency for museums as well as their audiences. Together they can center disability as significant program and exhibition content, include disability representation and perspectives, and ensure that environments -- physical, communication, sensory, and…

Service learning for business students is an important activity for learning professionalism while adding volunteer and leadership experiences to their resume. The purposeful inclusion of in-field volunteerism in the accounting curriculum by participation in the USA's Volunteer Income Tax Assistance (VITA) program each spring offers a host of…

Although the tenets of modern servant leadership originated by Greenleaf (1970) have long been applied to service enterprise, no known research has applied the principles to the self-perception of AmeriCorps volunteers who commit to one year of service. The purpose of this mixed-method study was to determine whether volunteers who commit to one…