Volunteer

Volunteers are the heart and soul of the Yellowknife Community Garden Collective. From the volunteer Board of Directors to our garden managers and garden site team members, our Collective is run entirely by our dedicated volunteers. We invite you to become a part of our valuable volunteer team.  There are many types of jobs to get involved in, from helping out at a work bee to facilitating a workshop. Depending on your interest and capacity, you can choose the level of involvement that you want to commit to. 

Keeping the Yellowknife Community Garden Collective running smoothly takes work and coordination. To share the load, all members of the Collective are expected to spend a few hours over the year helping with jobs that improve our shared garden spaces and garden community. As a minimum, we require members to volunteer for 2 hours each year but more help is always welcome! 

What can I do as a volunteer?

There are many types of jobs to get involved in, such as taking on a task at an event or becoming a gardening mentor to a new gardener. Depending on your interest and capacity, you can choose your area of commitment. Here are some examples of ways you can support the Collective:

 

1.     Join our Mailing List

We send out our newsletter monthly during the gardening season. Be in the loop about current projects, upcoming events, and interesting news. This is also a great way to keep up to date on current and upcoming volunteer opportunities! When you sign up for a plot, you are automatically added to the newletter mailing list.

 

2.     Become a Gardener or Supporting Member

Members are people who support the Yellowknife Community Garden Collective simply by paying an annual membership as a gardener or supporting member (a supporting member is one without a garden plot). This may not sound like much but it’s actually very important for us. When we apply for grants it is important for us to demonstrate that we represent the interests of others and the community as a whole (e.g. providing education and hands-on experience in the creation and maintenance of an environmentally sustainable, organic garden in a northern environment; and assisting in food security needs of the whole community by providing food for people in need through donations to local charities). Having a large number of members is one way to do this. The more members we have and the more active those members are, the stronger we are as an organization.

 

3.     One-Time Opportunities

If you are looking for a shorter time commitment, consider signing up for a single event. These events would include smaller tasks that assist our Collective such as:

4.     Specialized Skill

Do you have a special skill that you would like to put to work for us? e,g., research, photography, gardening, canning and preserving food, carpentry, video, or graphic design? Are you a musician, writer, business owner, lawyer, filmmaker, plumber, or accountant who would like to help us out pro bono? Let us know! Email Communications Coordinator, at communications@ykgardencollective.org

 

5.     Longer-Term Opportunities

We have volunteer opportunities available that require a longer time commitment and more responsibility. This could include tasks such as:

6.     Garden Site Team Member

There is a Garden Site Team at each of the community garden sites. They support the garden manager with a variety of roles: 

7.      Board of Directors

The Yellowknife Community Garden Collective is governed by a group of volunteer Board of Directors. The Board provides high level guidance for the organization. Board members also take an active role in organizing, promoting, and staffing YCGC events. The Board meets once per month.

For more information about our Board of Directors, click here.

If you are interested in joining the Board, please let us know! We welcome your expression of interest at any time. Please email Jenn, our Communications Coordinator, at communications@ykgardencollective.org