The garden mentor will provide support to refugee families recently resettled into Salt Lake City. He/she acts as a mentor to the family’s community gardening efforts. The Garden mentor will work one on one with the family to ensure they have transportation to the garden and will help them cultivate their gardens. In addition, the garden mentor will ensure that all rules of the garden are being followed by the family. If conflicts arise, they will report them to the REACH Coordinator for conflict resolution between family and garden facility. Garden mentors meet with their family once a week for two hours for at least four months.
ESSENTIAL POSITION FUNCTIONS:
- Assist refugee family with transportation to their garden.
- Assist refugee family with maintaining the cleanliness of their garden and common areas through completion of the families required community service hours.
- Assist refugee family with cultivating their gardens.
- Assist the IRC staff and garden staff by reporting any problems to the IRC REACH Coordinator for conflict resolution.
- Other related duties as assigned.
REQUIREMENTS:
- Must attend IRC general volunteer orientation - held once a month (check events calendar for upcoming dates and times)
- Able to commit at least eight hours a month for four months; schedule is otherwise flexible
- Communicate hours and activities on a monthly basis to IRC
- Keep confidentiality agreements
- Reliable and flexible
- Willing to learn about cross-cultural communication and ethnic backgrounds of clients
- Willing to adhere to IRC volunteer and workplace policies, including confidentiality policies and respect for family experiences
- Willingness to learn about the family and interact on a regular basis
- Ability to communicate clearly and effectively in English; additional fluency in a refugee language preferred
Reports to: Hailey Nielson, IRC REACH Coordinator
If you are interested in this opportunity, check the Events Calendar for upcoming Volunteer Orientation dates and times.
