Volunteer Opportunities

<<Click here for our printable volunteer sign-up form>>

The Rye Nature Center owes much of its success to its Friends, and the volunteer support we receive in all areas of our operation.  We have over 500 volunteers who collectively give over 7,000 hours of service to the community each year.

We ask our volunteers to give according to their TIME and TALENT.  And everyone and anyone has at least some of each to contribute! 

In return we offer an the chance to work in a family friendly environment with a dedicated staff.  Orientation, training and guidance are available for all of the volunteer jobs.  Students can apply their volunteer experience to community service hours for school, scout badges or confirmation, bar mitzvah and bat mitzvah requirements.

REGULAR VOLUNTEERS:

Event Volunteers

If you can only give one or two days per year, come for our Spring or Fall work days or for a special community event such as Old Fashioned Winter’s Afternoon (February) Earth Day (April), Strawberry Sunday (May) or Fall Festival (November).

Program (Teaching) Volunteers

An interest in natural history and love of children are pre-requisites for joining our Program Volunteer Team.  Program help includes assisting our educators present our weekday youth ecology programs and to help with weekend and evening family events. Choose a session and help out for two hours per week.

Habitat Volunteers

Habitat Volunteers adopt special projects, join in on work days, or come on a regular basis to help with our long list of repairs and improvements.  Any experience with household maintenance, gardening or landscaping are talents we value in our Habitat Volunteers.  We especially need adults with light carpentry experience for a variety of maintenance tasks.

Animal Care:

Our Animal Care Corps helps to keep our collection of 50 animals happy and healthy.  All these animals are used in programs with children, so they need some human contact each day.

Office Helpers

Our Office/Administration Volunteers helps in was as simple as answering the phone and greeting visitors at our front desk to helping with grant writing and publicity.  We need volunteers who can sort, file, maintain a data base and help with periodic mailings.

<<Click here for our printable volunteer sign-up form>>

SPECIAL PROJECT VOLUNTEERS:

Corporate Work Groups

Companies such as Cadbury-Schweppes American Beverages, Nokia, Pepsi Bottling Group, Viacom, and others have take a day off from the office or plant to help us with projects such as creating the Outdoor Classroom, fencing the Ruins, painting the Program Shed and building the Scout Camping Area.  We can accommodate groups up to 40 and assign a staff person to captain each group of 10 volunteers.  Corporate work groups are held in conjunction with the Corporate Volunteer Program of The Volunteer Center of Westchester County.  Call our office to schedule a date and choose from available projects.

Eagle Scout, Gold Award, Bar and Bat Mitzvah Projects:

We have a list of projects just right for a variety of interests, or you can bring us your own ideas of ways to help the environment and serve the community.  <<Click here for the list.>>

Youth Volunteer Work Days

We have work days for middle school, junior high and high school students to help with a variety of projects from trail work to painting walls to washing the glass classroom's windows to planting trees and gardens.  these are held on Martin Luther King, Jr. Day and on Election Day each year.  Other dates are announced from time to time when there is a day off from school that is not a major holiday.  Work days are 10:00 AM to 2:00 PM with a break at noon for pizza and socializing.  See our calendar for details.  <<Click here to go back to the calendar>>.