By Lesley Morrissey
In January, YACC hosted its second annual “Cheers To Volunteers” event. This is a night, early in the year, where we get all of our volunteers from the previous year together virtually to “raise a glass” to their efforts. All year we thank and recognize our volunteers, but we like to take one night where we all get to come together and celebrate the awesomeness of these individuals.
During 2021, YACC had over 70 YACCer volunteers — these are volunteers from the YACCer community who give of their time to help their peers throughout the year. They ensure their peers are supported through their cancer experiences. Even when they, themselves may be struggling, they still show up for the community. Their impact is immeasurable, but we did take some time to look into the quantifiable side of this impact.
While statistics only show numbers and not the emotional impact — which, in my humble opinion, would be off the charts for our group of volunteers — I still feel it is a measurable fact that can help to get our brains around what our volunteers actually do for this community:
In 2021, our volunteer base helped YACC deliver:
- Over 160 Chats to over 1,500 participants
- 49 Yakkity YACC Chats (which are led weekly) to over 1,100 participants
- Localife events (virtual, and in-person when possible) with over 300 participants
- Over 30 YACCtivists posts on the web, which helped each of the 450+ new connections to YACC feel less alone.
- National virtual events to over 1,500 people
With an office staff of only seven during 2021, the above would have been completely impossible without the help of these magical volunteers. The lives they touched in 12 short months, with the difficulties of COVID-19 still remaining with us, is unbelievable and we at YACC HQ are so grateful to these individuals.
We raised our mugs of hot chocolate to this wonderful group and we know the full YACC community is with us when we say THANK YOU! Changing lives may not be easy, but it is so worth it, and our volunteers work hard to improve the lives of their peers each and every day.
