Volunteering: Jason’s Story

Jason is a local resident who started attending our Community Gardening session at Root’n’Fruit Community Allotment in 2020. Jason had no background in gardening and had never participated in the hobby before but was looking for something to keep him occupied. Jason quickly become a core participant at the weekly sessions and informally volunteered his time regularly. He developed skills in gardening and DIY, he even helped to build a new shed from plans we drew up at the allotment. Jason became very familiar with the allotment and was very welcoming to new visitors, offering to give them a tour and to show them around.

In 2022, Jason formally joined our volunteer programme supporting our paid staff to deliver sessions to the community, help to maintain the community allotment, and help with local tidy up projects in the community. Since joining formally, Jason has also volunteered at larger events we’ve put on.

Recently, Jason has also shown interest in becoming a volunteer befriender, along side his existing volunteer role. Jason is an extremely friendly person and there’s never a dull moment when he’s around, so we look forward to supporting him enter this new role.

Not only have Jason’s existing skills developed, he has gained new skills and interests and his confidence has grown. We are very proud to have Jason within our team.