See attached documents for paper instructions. Below I have written out my personal experience volunteering at the Houston food bank which is required to make up 3 pages of the essay. Feel free to reach out for any additional details.
My first shift was on 6/10/24 from 8am to 12pm
My second shift was on 6/10/24 from 1pm to 4pm
My third shift was on 6/11/24 from 1pm to 4pm
Before each shift you walk into the building, check in at the front desk giving your full name, after I was instructed to wait in the lobby. Before the volunteer shift brings somone will stand in front of the lobby area and give an introduction and give a brief history about the food bank. After the intro the person that gave the intro will start grouping people off into separate groups which will then go help volunteer in different areas of the food bank.
For my first shift I worked with an organization within the Houston food bank called Brighter Bites where volunteers helped with Putting down wood palettes, and stacking them with boxes of assorted produce, a staff member would tell us how many boxes of diferente produce would go on the palettes and then we would wrap up the palettes that have been staked with boxes of produce with saran wrap and placing them to be ready for distribution to schools. The last hour we filled produces boxes with onions.
For my second and third shift I worked within the Community resource center (CRC) at the Houston food bank that is open to what they call “neighbors” (people) who are enrolled in the food for change program. The community resource center is like a Small store where neighbors shop for what they need. They first walk in and check in at the table in the front, they are provided shopping carts and are able to walk around the CRC where there is produce in the first aisle, dry goods in the second and non food items in the third aisle. Along the back wall there was cases of water and electrolyte drinks as well as fridges stocked with frozen chicken, beef, and pork. My job was to help them “check out” where I sorted the items they choose into boxes according to wether they were fresh produce, dry foods, or non food items. I then took stats, of the time a person checked out, their full name, the weight (in lbs) of fresh produce, dry food and non food items. After I did this a different volunteer would helped take all the time to the persons car. While at the other volunteers helped sort out good and bad produce and portioned a variety of good produce in mesh bags that equaled about 10lbs. I also built boxes that had been already been broken down and prepped them to fill with whatever people shopped for. At near around 3:45 pm I cleaned my station wiping down all surfaces and sweeping the area. Thought the shift I also assisted with refilling the shelves with food and produce. Right before 4pm me and other volunteers helped staff members put away the produce and shelving that was set up.
