WFWA is a 100% volunteer-run organizing drive of low-income farm, service and seasonal workers and their families. Your participation will make a difference from your first day in the door. Don’t wait, call today!
Get Involved
Volunteer At WFWA
Call: (530) 790-0980
You can volunteer…
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As an individual
As an individual, you can make a huge impact through joining with a team of others concerned about the conditions of farm and other low-income workers in the Sacramento Valley. Don’t wait, call today!
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As a group
From college classes to church groups, labor unions and civic clubs, groups large and small are welcome to participate with WFWA.
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As a professional
Doctors, lawyers, trades people, graphic designers, journalists and many other professionals can volunteer their professional skills to advance the just cause of farm workers.
How It Works
No Machines or Automated Phone Trees, Just Human Contact
WFWA’s phone lines are staffed by volunteers who are ready to answer your call!
1
You Call Us
Call us seven days a week, including evenings.
2
We Answer
A volunteer will answer your call and any of your questions.
3
You Schedule to Volunteer!
No prior experience is necessary and you are productive your first day as a volunteer!
With WFWA you can…
Build a Benefit Program
As a volunteer with WFWA, you will join WFWA members in organizing and delivering material benefits to WFWA membership families. The benefit program includes, food, clothing, legal advice, preventive medical care and more.
Strengthen WFWA’s Membership
As a volunteer you will work shoulder-to-shoulder with farm workers in the Sacramento Valley to overcome the barriers that keep workers divided and isolated, as we become stronger and more united!
Learn Professional Organizing Skills On-the-job
With four decades of successful organizing experience, new volunteers can benefit from the experience of the old timers combined with the hope for the future.
Participate in Seasonal Campaigns
WFWA is open year-round, but each season brings new challenges for low-income workers. As a volunteer you will address seasonal needs as expressed by WFWA’s membership council.
Produce an Independent Newspaper
Volunteers learn how to write, edit, design, publish and distribute an independent membership newspaper. If you have skills you can teach others or if you want to learn you can start today!
Lead Community Organizing Campaigns
Volunteers work with WFWA’s membership council as they pursue organizing campaigns to address policies that impact their lives, from climate policy to campaigns to stop utility shutoffs.
If not you, who?
If not now, when?
No Minimum
Flexible Hours
Volunteers are needed daytimes and evenings, whether for a day, an hour, a week, a summer, or anytime. Call WFWA today at (530) 790-0980.
Get Started
Simple Steps to Get Involved
On-the-Job Training
No Experience Needed
We use “on-the-job” training, so anyone can learn while taking action and making a difference. No prior experience or special skills are needed. Volunteers are productive from their first day in!
Learn Organizing Skills
Dare to Care
Participation is open to all those who dare to care and invest the time. Poverty wages force working families to “choose” between putting food on the table, paying rent and utility bills. Your participation can make a difference for farm workers organizing to end poverty conditions.
Weekly and Monthly Volunteer Activities
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Food Distribution
Weekly
WFWA members may enroll in the association’s budget-saving Benefit Plan II program and participate in weekly free-of-charge supplemental food distributions featuring fresh organic produce and other nutritional foods. Volunteers are needed year-round to pick up, sort, box and distribute food to enrolled members.
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Medical Education Session
Monthly
Volunteer physicians and registered nurses provide health education sessions on a variety of health topics such as diabetes, high blood pressure, nutrition and exercise.
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“Know Your Law” Session
Monthly
Volunteer attorneys present general legal information in group settings as well as private legal advice consultations, accompanied by a WFWA lay advocate. Topics include wage theft, evictions, discrimination and what to do if pulled over. WFWA needs more volunteer attorneys, legal advocates and interpreters.
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Clothing Distribution
Weekly
WFWA volunteers assist with sorting and organizing clothing, doing benefit intakes and assisting members in filling their clothing requests.
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Benefit Advocacy
Weekly
Farm workers, domestic workers, service workers and other low-paid workers can’t win without organization. WFWA teaches the skill of advocacy. You can learn how to fight to keep a member’s lights on, how to help workers win back unpaid wages, how to expunge medical debt, and fight government and corporate denials to the most vulnerable members.
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Operation Camp Crew
Sundays
WFWA members who work the Sacramento Valley’s farms host WFWA volunteers at farm labor camps to bring the benefit of organization, community connection and material aid, such as food, clothing, sun protection and cooling supplies to their families, and to report on farm worker conditions. Call WFWA to join us!
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Membership Canvass
Saturdays
WFWA membership canvasses are the lifeblood of our grassroots farm worker organizing drive. Alone and isolated we cannot achieve anything; united we can win! Volunteers canvass door-to-door in low-income neighborhoods where members and potential members live to build organization where it’s needed the most.
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Publication Session
Weekly
Join WFWA’s publication staff! You can learn – or help teach – how to produce the next issue of WFWA’s newspaper, the Western Farm Worker, to tell the truth about low-income workers organizing for economic justice, and our seasonal Sponsors Guide. We also need volunteers to design flyers. Call WFWA!
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Community Outreach
Twice weekly
Volunteers set up information tables in front of grocery stores, at local community events and other locations to promote WFWA so that others can join our cause. This is one way WFWA enlists new friends and participants to come in and make a difference. Please call if you can volunteer or if you know of a location where WFWA can set up an information table.
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Mailout Session
Weekly
Volunteers prepare and send letters about our current campaigns to people who have joined WFWA and have expressed an interest in volunteering or supporting WFWA. We need volunteers to help with the daily letter mailouts as well as to assist with the bulk mailing of WFWA’s membership newspaper and Sponsors Guide.
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Phone Training Session
Weekly
Volunteers are essential to all of WFWA’s activities year-round. Volunteers conduct group telephone training sessions to call members about upcoming benefit activities and re-contact interested individuals met on community outreach about participating with WFWA’s organizing activities scheduled each week.
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Speaking Engagements
Call to Schedule
WFWA volunteers and members speak to college classes, clubs, church groups and other groups to teach about the economic problems WFWA’s members face and how people from all walks of life can participate in building solutions from the bottom up.
Participate as a volunteer in seasonal events and campaigns
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Winter Survival Campaign
While winter weather can get into the freezing temperatures, WFWA heats up to protect the lives of low-income workers suffering from high heating costs, lack of adequate winter wear and loss of work hours due to seasonal changes. Volunteers play an important role in filling benefit requests from members and canvassing in low-income neighborhoods to check on elderly residents often confined to their homes.
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Spring Expansion Campaign
WFWA’s Spring Expansion Campaign is a material form of hope for our collective future. Along with an expansion of WFWA’s Benefit Program and community outreach, the campaign includes WFWA’s Spring Family Brunch and Children’s Easter Egg Hunt which features a hearty meal, games, prizes and fun for membership families.
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Farm Worker Summer Campaign
WFWA’s Farm Worker Summer Campaign reaches seasonal farm workers at their homes through door-to-door membership canvasses, and migrant farm workers through Operation Camp Crews to farm labor camps throughout the Sacramento Valley. WFWA runs distributions at the farm labor camps of food, clothing, hygiene supplies, sun protection, bottles of water and cooling equipment like fans and swamp coolers.
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Back-to-School Campaign
The expenses low-income working parents face for back-to-school clothes and supplies, medical exams for school entry and immunizations can break an already over-stretched budget. Our Back-to-School clothing and supply distribution can save WFWA membership families up to $500 – money that can be used to pay for rent, utilities, food and medicines these families would otherwise be forced to do without.
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Holiday Campaign
WFWA’s annual Children’s Safe and Sane Halloween Party and chaperoned Trick-or-Treat for Farm Workers is the first in a series of events organized by and for low-income workers and their families through the holiday season. In addition, WFWA runs a budget-saving program for members to help other members meet seasonal needs such as holiday food basket distributions for Thanksgiving and Christmas time, and holiday toy distributions to parents for their private family gift giving to their children. Join the festivities!
Illustration by Zachary Pullen
Organizing As a Profession
Full-time Organizers Needed!
WFWA provides organizer training through all our activities, thus giving volunteers the opportunity to become professional volunteer organizers. It requires daring to care, and investing the hard work to learn while doing – engaging in “on-the-job training.” Volunteers are needed 365 days a year, daytimes and evenings, whether for a day, an hour, a week, a summer, a year or for the rest of your life! We own a strategy, a method and have a track record of success. The only missing ingredient is you! Call WFWA today!
The most sustainable fuel of all time!
WFWA = VOLUNTEER POWER!
Volunteer your professional skills as a…
Medicine
Doctor, Nurse or Other Medical Professional
As a doctor, nurse or other medical professional you can volunteer on general medical sessions, providing routine health screenings and exams, or by conducting health education sessions on a variety of health topics of concern to low-income workers.
Call: (530) 790-0980
Dentistry
Dentist or Dental Professional
Non-emergency dental care is often inaccessible to low-income workers and their family. To help with corrective and preventive care, dentists and dental assistants can volunteer to see WFWA members in their private offices, or provide dental hygiene education sessions at our office.
Call: (530) 790-0980
Law
Attorney or Legal Professional
Volunteer attorneys present information on legal topics of concern to low-income workers by participating in WFWA’s “Know Your Law” Sessions at our office or migrant labor camps. Volunteer attorneys can also hold legal advice sessions to provide individual advice upon request.
Call: (530) 790-0980
Skilled Trades
Construction Worker, Electrician or Plumber
Professional trades workers can help keep WFWA’s 365 day-a-year, all-volunteer efforts up and running by donating time or resources to insure WFWA’s office is well maintained and upgraded to better fill the needs of WFWA’s membership.
Call: (530) 790-0980
Arts
Graphic Designer, Illustrator or Artist
Graphic designers can assist in designing eye-catching posters and flyers, as well as assisting with the layout of WFWA’s newspaper. Graphic designers also lead design training sessions with other volunteers. Illustrators and artists can contribute their art to bolster WFWA’s flyers or posters.
Call: (530) 790-0980
Other
Professional in Other Areas of Interest to WFWA Members
If you do not see your profession listed here but think you still may be able to help, don’t wait, call WFWA’s office today and discuss with a volunteer organizer how you may be able to contribute. All ideas and suggestions are welcome!
Call: (530) 790-0980
If One is Good, Many is Better
Get Your Group Involved
WFWA works with churches, unions, clubs and classes to involve their entire group in activities that advance the just cause of farm workers. From food and clothing distributions to mass mailing sessions to sorting and organizing clothing and supplies, groups have played an important role in WFWA’s work.
To get more information, contact WFWA’s office and explain that you want to get your group involved. The first step will be for a representative of your group to come in to learn more about WFWA activities and how your group can participate.
Call to discuss ways your group can participate with WFWA
Meet with a WFWA representative to learn more about the work and activities of WFWA
Volunteer with your group at a preplanned activity that will help to advance WFWA’s struggle to end the poverty conditions facing agricultural workers
