Who we are:

At Visit from the Stork we believe every parent should have access to the tools and resources they need to give their family a better quality of life.

We provide consistent, empowering and engaging support to families in need across the cities of Salford and Manchester. We are the support network for parents and their children who have no one else to turn to; a tribe of parents and professionals alike who encourage, empower and connect each other.

What are we looking for?

We are looking for a passionate, friendly and enthusiastic individual to join us in launching our new Stork Support hub in Harpurhey, North Manchester, where families referred into our service will come and collect their baby essential items as well as access wraparound support. This is a new evolution of our Stork Support project, which has supported over 3,000 unique families with over 10,000 parcels of baby essentials.

Ideally, our volunteer will be someone interested in doing some training around family support and have lived experience of accessing support services as a parent or already have some professional experience. Our volunteer is expected to have a good level of written and spoken English and able to use online documents such as Google sheets and Google Docs, we will provide a device for this.

What would you be doing as a volunteer?

Our new volunteer will be trained to work alongside the Outreach worker team at Harpurhey Sure Start centre to meet and greet our clients, have strengths-based conversations with families and be able to support and signpost parents to relevant services in the local area.

You will be the face of Visit from the Stork at our Harpurhey hub; using our spreadsheet you will gather what the families need from our cupboard, keeping an inventory of stock we have left. When parents come in, you will deliver great customer service and make them feel at ease by greeting them, giving them information and sitting down to do the Sure Start Registration form with them. We want to offer our families as much support as possible, so you will be having strengths-based conversations with them to find out if there are any other needs that you may need to signpost for; housing issues, food insecurity, information about local groups or other services such as Early Help or the Outreach team. You will be supported by an Outreach worker on call if you need them, or a member of staff from VFTS will also always be available on the phone if needed. Other tasks you may be completing would be Healthy Start application forms, Sure Start maternity grant forms, referrals to the Infant feeding team and more. 

You may on occasion also have to go to the shops to buy some stock to fill up the Stork Support cupboard (at no cost to you personally). These are the tasks you will be doing;

• Greeting clients 
• Keeping an inventory of stock
• Using Google Sheets to record outcomes 
• Filling out Sure Start registration forms
• Giving out baby essentials and supermarket vouchers
• Giving out infant feeding information 
• Having strengths-based conversations with clients and triaging other support they might need 
• Signposting to relevant services 
• Signposting / referrals to Outreach workers 

• Filling in Healthy Start application forms 
• Giving relevant information about VFTS and Sure Start services 
• Great customer service 
• Refilling stock from the local shop when needed 
• Offering peer support, empathy and a kind face!

Time commitment; 2-3 hours per week, ideally on a Friday morning.