More than 300 volunteers help staff virtually every department at Nashville CARES, including Client Services, Fund Development, Education, General Office, Administration and Special Events.
Every day volunteers are helping clients directly by delivering food for CARE-a-Van Cuisine. Members of CARE Teams are cleaning clients' homes and yards, driving them to the doctor, going to the grocery, or providing friendship and pastoral support.
Volunteers staff the HEARTLine, answering the thousands of requests for help from clients, giving information about HIV to people who fear they or a loved one have been exposed, and making referrals either within CARES or to another service that can help. Volunteers are the mainstay of many office activities, seeing to it that newsletters and invitations are mailed on time or doing critical data entry.
Still other volunteers participate in the many outreach programs of the Education Department, speaking to community groups about CARES, staffing booths at community events, going onto the internet to educate people in chat rooms, or distributing prevention materials on the streets.
And, of course, none of CARES's special events such as the AIDS Walk and Artrageous could happen without the help of volunteers to plan and execute all the many important functions, from design work to setup and breakdown.
