Volunteering with Support Ukraine
There are so many awesome impact organisations out there, who are all working hard to make our world a better place. one of those impact organisations is support ukraine, a charity working to empower refugees by connecting them with crucial aid and donations.
At Matchable, we operate on two fronts: to support employee wellbeing by connecting volunteers with the causes that matter most to them, whilst simultaneously providing much needed volunteer support to our wonderful community of impact organisations. Our impact organisations work across a wide range of causes that are aligned with the United Nations’ Sustainability Development Goals, tackling important global challenges through innovation and hard work to make the biggest impact.
One of those awesome impact organisations is Support Ukraine.
Support Ukraine are a charitable organisation that were established in response to the ongoing crisis happening in Ukraine. To date, the charity have delivered over 400 tonnes of humanitarian aid to Ukraine through their volunteering network, and their efforts are still going strong!
We have partnered with their distribution centre in Fulham, which has become a hub of coordination and streamlining of aid supplies, and where Support Ukraine are in desperate need of volunteers!
“Using Matchable to find large volumes of volunteers has been excellent…The volunteer group sizes vary from small groups to larger groups, and in a 2 month period, Matchable have supplied us with so many volunteers that they have completed over 500 hours of impact. Being a Ukrainian charity, that is a gigantic amount of support, support which we would not have accessed without Matchable.”
But what does 500 hours of impact look like?
Due to the dynamic nature of the donation centre, no two days of volunteering are the same!
Lawrence, a Senior Analyst at Aurum, recently buddied up with his work colleague Michael to head to Support Ukraine and offer their time.
“[We were given] a tour of the warehouse where the organisation receives donations, sorts them into boxes and gets them ready for transportation to Ukraine,” Lawrence says. “We were asked to be “front of house”, that is to say outside the warehouse at a table near a busy thoroughfare with lots of footfall, handing out leaflets (displaying QR codes for online donations), soliciting medical/food/spare change donations from passers-by, taking in to the warehouse any items that were brought in during the day, and answering questions people had about what was going on. We handed out maybe a hundred leaflets, took in perhaps three to five donations of clothes/children’s toys and spoke to a lot of people about what the organisation was doing and there appeared to be a lot of interest!”
Meanwhile, Russ, CEO of Avery and Brown, also volunteered with Support Ukraine and was helping in a completely different area.
“The warehouse is huge and full of boxes of supplies - clothes, food, medicine - which need sorting and moving. So I did exactly what I’d hoped I would be doing; something as different as possible from staring at a laptop all day. A lot of lifting later, the warehouse was looking in much better shape than when I arrived and the team was happy.”
Check out more of what Russ had to say here.
At Matchable, we like to put our money where our mouth is, so some of our team headed over to Support Ukraine to lend a helping hand ourselves!
“A lot of my day to day job is encouraging people to get involved in volunteering projects that mean a lot to them, which is so awesome!” says Lindsay, Volunteer Matchmaker here at Matchable. “I think it’s really important to lead by example and use my paid volunteering time (thank you, Matchable!) to give back too. It was great to meet the team who are on the ground helping refugees in need of support, and there’s nothing quite like the buzz you get when you feel like you’re making a real difference!”
The Matchable team spent the afternoon sorting through donations in the warehouse – lots of tinned goods, children’s toys and medical supplies – so that these are ready to be distributed to those who need it most. If you’d like to check out how you can donate some items for a good cause, check out these instructions on what’s needed!
Support Ukraine are always looking to raise awareness of the ongoing crisis and distribute aid to as many refugees as possible, but they can’t do this without volunteer support! If you’re already part of the Matchable community and would like to offer your time, head back to the Matchable platform and use the ‘in-person’ filter to sign up to the project and find your perfect Match!
If you’re new here and looking to get involved with Support Ukraine, you can find out more about what we do here.