Cleveland: Volunteer Fair seeks your time, talents

CLEVELAND -- If you're interested in volunteering but don't know just where to start, your opportunity can begin Friday (March 19) at the "Day of Caring" volunteer fair.

The event will be held from 9:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. at Cleveland's Intercontinental Hotel.

More than 80 Northeast Ohio organizations will be on hand to match the skills and interests of potential volunteers and mentors with the groups which can best use them.

Briana Thurman knows the value of volunteers and mentors very well.

As a teenage mother struggling to finish high school, she was mentored when she entered a program for girls like her at the Old Stone Education Center downtown.

"They lifted me up spiritually, mentally, and emotionally," Briana says of the women who volunteered on her behalf. "They brought me through the storm."

Today, having earned her GED through the Old Stone program, Thurman is studying nursing at Cuyahoga Community College and is well on her way to becoming a registered nurse.

Sandy Baynard is now an executive with a local bank. She, too, was a teenage mom who depended on volunteers and mentors to guide her to eventual success. She now mentors teenage girls.

"To be able to go out and give a part of my time, a part of my family, a part of my experiences that I can share with an individual, it means a whole lot to me," says Baynard. "And I can look back and say that I know one day it will mean a whole lot to that individual."

Shameka Jones Taylor is another successful young woman mentored when she was a teenage mom. She is active in planning the Day of Caring Volunteer Fair.

"It took people who believed in me, people who cared for me," she told WKYC, "for me not to become another statistic."

The Volunteer Fair will welcome people from all walks of life who have time, talent, and experience to share. All you have to do is come to the Intercontinental Hotel near the Cleveland Clinic between 9:30 a.m. and 2:30 p.m. Discount parking will be provided.