Volunteer with people experiencing homelessness in Oxford

Please email volunteering.oxford@crisis.org.uk.

If there are no roles advertised for your Skylight, this means we have no volunteer opportunities available in that service now. However, don’t worry. You can still help to end homelessness by volunteering to raise funds and awareness. You can find opportunities to do this on the fundraising page. Alternatively, please do check back regularly as we are sure opportunities will come up. 

Most of our roles don’t require any qualifications or experience. All you need is empathy and a desire to end homelessness. Some roles will require specific experience to provide specialist support to our members. This will be specified in the role advert.  

We recommend you read the role advert carefully before applying for a role and if you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact your Volunteer and Involvement Lead. 

We want you to have a great time volunteering for us. We understand that whilst volunteering in our services can be incredibly rewarding, there are times it can bring challenges and be emotionally demanding. To ensure you have all the support you need to remain emotionally well, as well as your Volunteer Supervisor and Volunteer and Involvement Lead, you will also have access to: 

• ‘Our Space’ – A monthly online group, just for you and your peers, offering you a regular safe space to connect and reflect with your peers from across the country. Our Space is about getting together with those with similar experiences to share your challenges and how you can learn from them, make sense of the feelings your volunteering can evoke and get the most from your volunteering experience. 
• Volunteer Wellbeing Programme - A free, confidential, in-the-moment support service, where trained case managers can provide you with emotional support, advice, and guidance on a range of issues. 

As part of our recruitment, we will ask you to meet with us, either virtually or in person. We see this meeting as a conversation where we can find out more about you and your suitability for the volunteer role while also giving you the chance to find out more about us and whether the role is right for you. We want you to feel relaxed and comfortable when we meet, and we will share with you some guidance notes to help with this. 

Each of our roles has a clear training plan in place to ensure you have everything you need to feel confident and equipped for the role. All volunteers in our services will attend a welcome session with the Volunteer and Involvement Lead and role specific training with either the Volunteer and Involvement Lead or the Volunteer Supervisor. In addition, you will need to complete e-learning on data protection, safeguarding, equality, diversity and inclusion, unconscious bias and how we work with members. This is to ensure that we are keeping everyone safe, creating an inclusive service and protecting everyone’s dignity. Depending on your role, there may also be other essential learning you need to complete before starting. 

Your Volunteer and Involvement Lead will support you to complete this learning. Once you have started in role, if your role involves interacting with our members, you will also be asked to attend ‘boundaries’ and ‘managing important conversations’ workshops. 

We know many of our volunteers are keen to continue learning whilst in role, so once you have started in role there will be a suite of learning topics available for you to access at your convenience through our learning platform. There will also be opportunities for less formal learning through your Skylight. 

Many of the roles in our services will require a disclosure check, (either basic or enhanced) - you will be able to see this on the role description. If the role does, we use a digital system to manage this and we will request and pay for it (where payment is needed). 

If you have a criminal conviction, this does not automatically mean you cannot volunteer for us. However, we may need to ask you more about the conviction to be able to do a risk assessment and decide if you can or cannot volunteer.  

We ask for two referees and need one back. If the volunteer role requires a Crisis IT account, then one of these must be a professional or academic reference – this can include references from other volunteering roles you have done. References should be someone who has known you recently, who is not family.  

The voice and expertise of people with lived experience is vital in ensuring our service is truly meeting the needs of our members. We encourage anyone with lived experience to apply for our volunteer roles. 

We also involve members and people with lived experience of homelessness in opportunities across the organisation including our Experts by Experience panel. For more details, speak to your local Volunteer and Involvement Lead. 

You can claim any reasonable out of pocket expenses for travel or lunch if you volunteer for over five hours. Your Volunteer and Involvement Lead will explain to you our expenses policy, including any limits and how to claim. We use a digital system called Concur to manage volunteer expenses which allows you to store receipts, log journeys and track your payment. 

We only currently have volunteer opportunities within our Skylights during operational hours – this is so we can ensure we have members of the team available if you need any support and to keep you safe. 

If you are looking for more flexible volunteering, you may want to look at volunteer opportunities supporting our fundraising and community engagement work. 

<Link to opportunities> 

Detailed references can be provided at your volunteer supervisor’s discretion. Otherwise, a start and finish date can be provided for current volunteers or if your volunteering end date is within two years of the reference request. 

We are based at The Old Fire Station, 40 George St, OX1 2AQ.

We recommend using public transport to get to the Skylight. Oxford has several park and rides with a good bus service. The train station is also within walking distance.