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26 May 2022
Address of the National President at the 112nd National Annual Meeting
IODE keeps evolving. During this pandemic, which has dominated my time as National President, we have learned how to connect with each other using new technology in a most effective manner. We have figured out how to raise funds and collect other items in a socially distanced way while still connecting with each other outdoors. This ability to think outside the box and figure out how to make a difference despite adversity is important to recognize because it is an approach that will assure the survival of IODE and support our organization into the future. Having more than 1,500 women across Canada all Working Together for Many is truly a force that does make a difference. There are other women out there that care about the same things that we care about. We just have to make a bit of an effort to find them. Those women want to make a difference and do not know that IODE provides a platform for doing it. We want to include them; we are all organized; we are dedicated to making a difference; we are enthusiastic about it and we have fun!
The pandemic has provided the Board of Directors and the National Advisory Committee with time to focus on how IODE can change some of the ways it does things and think about how to improve what we do. We can partner with other organizations in our communities. We can partner our strengths – strong infrastructure as a charity and deep community involvement - with the financial resources of people who want to donate and make a difference. Primary chapters know what their communities need. They are allied with people in their communities who have needs that they tell our members about. We can articulate how people can provide that support and deliver the needed service. We are learning how to tell the stories of how money donated to us has made a difference in a person’s life and how those funds supports a community service. We are more and more using social media to reach out and tell people that we are here helping and serving others. Our mission to deliver education support, community service and citizenship programs is broad enough to allow us to serve everyone with money to donate and direct that money to a place where it helps to make a difference in peoples’ lives. We are learning how to be an ally of those in need, how to listen to them and refrain from projecting our personal ideas of help and support. We can let those in need lead in identifying what support is needed. In this way we give respect and learn to listen. We also can provide maximum value from the funds we have available. As I have said before, IODE has the flexibility in its structure to provide women with a platform that suits them for participating in charitable support and services in their communities. We have capable members who are ready to provide chapter leadership that is lean and effective. We know all the rules about how to be a registered charity and how to deliver real help. We are still learning what we can do to improve respect, justice and equity for Indigenous peoples. We can commit to equity, diversity and inclusion. We believe that every child matters and have directed our Share a Story … Bring a Book annual meeting project to childcare centres for Indigenous children for books about Indigenous culture, traditions and language. Our next steps in supporting Truth and Reconciliation would be to learn about the barriers faced by Indigenous people and try to understand them and alleviate them. We can make a difference by learning about Indigenous ways and becoming an ally. We have heard about our collective accomplishments during the past year and about how we are Working Together for Many. Thank you for the opportunity of serving you and for your support during the past three years. I am looking forward to continuing as a director and working with an amazing group of dedicated and talented national officers. It is time for a new national president and I wish her every success. I do hope that the next year allows us to meet with each other in person and enjoy good times together. Carol McCall
President IODE Canada _________________________ IODE Canada Head Office 40 Orchard View Blvd., Suite 219 Toronto ON M4R 1B9 13 February 2022
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Founder's Day Message
On Founder’s Day on 13th February, we celebrate the vision of our founder, Margaret Polson Murray and think about the thousands of IODE women whose tireless efforts have contributed to making Canada a better place during the past 122 years. IODE’s focus has broadened from initial patriotism and support of Canadian soldiers in the South African War to become the present-day registered charity “dedicated to enhancing the quality of life for individuals through education support, community service and citizenship programs”. With the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic still present, the usual activities of IODE members in planning fundraising and community projects continue to be curtailed. Despite the frustration of missing in-person meetings with members of our chapters, members have worked at doing what they can do to help and benefit others. Every bit has added up and together all our efforts have made a difference. Although resilience has been an oft-used word during the pandemic, it accurately describes what IODE members have shown during the past two years. IODE has been through a pandemic before. It is not surprising to learn that what IODE chapters and members did during the 1918-1919 influenza epidemic was to organize in church kitchens to make quarts of custard, broth, gruel and lemonade for many weeks to help families stricken by the influenza virus. In 1918, Canada’s population was about eight million and about 50,000 people died from the flu virus in just a few months. IODE survived that pandemic and is surviving this one and continues to help people get through COVID-19. Today, the ingenuity of many chapters led to organized drive-by donations of toys, grooming products and food bank items with socializing at drop-in garage coffee parties. Members have put together Afternoon Tea in a Box, Christmas wreaths, butter tarts and red pepper jelly; have sold chocolates, cupcake vouchers, poinsettias and gift certificates from nurseries; and one chapter even had a car rally that provided lots of distancing and raised funds successfully. Quite inspired! Donations in each of the past two years to IODE National Funds have exceeded the pre-Covid 2019 level. In particular, members made donations to IODE Snack Pack and TOGETHER FOR TOMORROW that achieved the 2021 goals of each fund. The donations to TOGETHER FOR TOMORROW were the equivalent of four hundred and four members’ national annual fees! The contributions from members in service, goods and funds have been strong and show how much they honour the mission of IODE and are prepared to support the collective effort of IODE across Canada during these difficult times. We continued to move forward with the completion of the revision and update of the 2004 version of the IODE Constitution and have implemented a Statement of Values. IODE Canada’s core values of respect, integrity, inclusiveness and dedication to excellence are the foundation of service to the public and IODE members. These core values provide us with a means of guiding and evaluating decisions, operations, planning and teamwork in support of IODE’s mission. Although these values have been held by IODE members, articulating them in a clear and concise statement serves to remind everyone that IODE members hold them as their guiding ethics. IODE is a successful charity that has organized groups of dedicated women who, alone and with other community organizations, work in many Canadian communities. With its mandate covering support for education, citizenship and individual and community services, this breadth of purpose allows members and chapters to design projects and programs that respond to the specific needs identified by each local chapter. Chapters and members can help in their own way to create a Canadian society in which everyone can flourish. Small local actions matter, and IODE women are doing things that are meaningful and important in their communities. What should we do about the year that is ahead? We have had the imagination to continue to contribute during the two past years of difficult times. It is important to continue doing what worked well and to share it with other IODE chapters. It is important to share stories of what chapters are doing on IODE websites, Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. To expand membership, we need to let the public know what IODE is all about and what we are doing in the community. Using social media is the most accessible and affordable way of communicating this information. At the National Annual Meeting, there will be online Zoom workshops on both fundraising ideas and using social media to assist chapters. We can appreciate what we have done and share it with others. Worrying about membership numbers accomplishes little but telling others about what is happening and how to find us can lead new members to us. Each year at this time, we think about our founder Margaret Polson Murray and how we can celebrate her mission to establish a patriotic women’s organization. As I have written before, patriotism at that time was an expression of civic responsibility and today civic responsibility includes patriotism and active participation in the public life of communities to contribute to the common good. At the time IODE was founded, women did not have the right to vote in Canada either provincially or federally. Property rights and legal rights to sign contracts in Canada are a matter of provincial jurisdiction and in 1900 were not available to all women across the country. The women who founded and joined IODE in the early years were trail-blazers and had amazing dedication and enthusiasm in organizing IODE. Later members honed it into a modern women’s organization that has continued to benefit others through past decades. Today, we are bringing the organization through another pandemic so we can help Canada and Canadians thrive in the future. What we do doesn’t have to be perfect to make a difference. Just keep positive, appreciate what you have and keep caring about IODE and thinking about how you can help to make someone else’s life a little better. Carol McCall
President IODE Canada _________________________ IODE Canada Head Office 40 Orchard View Blvd., Suite 219 Toronto ON M4R 1B9 04 June 2021
Address of the National President at the 121st National Annual Meeting
Make It Happen, Make A Difference |
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During the past 121 years, IODE’s focus has changed. These changes in focus have been the bases for IODE surviving for 121 years. Had IODE continued to focus only on supporting of our war effort and servicemen, it is most unlikely that we would be here as a strong organization of 1,750 members. The fact that we used our strong organizational structure to support other causes of education, service and citizenship in our communities has strengthened us. We became a registered charity in 1991, moving our organization into a premium category of non-profit organizations. Sometimes our members complain about our annual fees and extra charges. Sometimes we are compared by our members to volunteer organizations that charge minimal annual fees or none at all. Well, the old expression of comparing apples to apples is important. If it costs nothing in membership fees, it is likely that you do not receive anything from the organization. What does IODE provide? We can provide excellent service, solid reputation, support for charitable programs and charitable tax receipts for our members and to the members of other organizations who have members that do not pay fees, but have deep pockets. We can provide them with tax receipts and we receive their money to spend on services to help people we have identified as in need. We can put other peoples’ money to good use with our community-partner social agencies. We can partner our strength, strong infrastructure as a charity and deep community involvement with the financial resources of people who want to donate and make a difference. Our primary chapters know what their communities need. Our primary chapters who successfully recruit and attract new members have shown us the way. Every chapter looking for new members needs to maximize its exposure within the community and develop strong community partnerships. We can tell the stories of how money donated to us has made a difference in a person’s life and how it supports a community service. Our organization as a charity is our strength. Our mission to deliver education support, community service and citizenship programs is broad enough to allow us to serve everyone with money to donate. We can be personal shoppers for donors that want their money to go into their community and to make a difference. We can help working women direct their charitable donations to meaningful projects where they may also be able to spend their available time working at a community event. We know how many of our members enjoy being hands-on and we can figure out how to provide this opportunity to women in our communities who have very little time for volunteer activities, but enjoy being part of them. There are also women who have an interest in meaningful volunteer work and have the time to dedicate to it. IODE is well placed as a successful charity that can provide an organized structure and other committed women to work with in many communities across Canada. IODE has the flexibility in its structure to provide women with a platform that suits them for participating in charitable support and services in their communities. We also have capable members who are ready to help establish new chapters of women who can organize themselves in a way that suits their available time and their interests. A chapter can have a lean officer structure with just a secretary and a treasurer and meet less frequently or by Zoom only. We know how to be a registered charity, we have the infrastructure in place, we know other service organizations in our communities and we know people in need and how to deliver real help. Be proud of IODE! We do a wonderful job of operating as a charity and helping people in need. During this past year, with Covid-19 restrictions, we have all experienced the frustration of trying to continue our usual IODE activities. Chapters and members commented that 2020 was a time to be kind, to connect with people, to care, to be positive, to keep in touch and to realize that small amounts of assistance are also welcome. One chapter described doing random acts of kindness. We can make a difference by simply caring about people and showing that care in small ways. It is a time of loneliness and we can help with that too. Our members have described how much the members in their chapters enjoy the friendship and company of others in their chapter. Keeping in contact with others is particularly important and continuing to give of ourselves to others has attracted 66 new members during the past year. Your directors are looking at ways that we can help primary chapters to increase their membership and will be reporting to you about the strengths of IODE and about how we can work on addressing its weaknesses. Primarily, we need to keep up the good work and remember to offer other women the opportunity of joining us and becoming part of a great organization – IODE! Thank you for the opportunity of serving you and for your support and I am looking forward to another year as president working with an amazing group of dedicated and talented national officers. I hope that our next annual meeting will see us meeting with each other in person and that we will also be able to have members present by videoconference. Carol McCall
President IODE Canada _________________________ IODE Canada Head Office 40 Orchard View Blvd., Suite 219 Toronto ON M4R 1B9 |
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13 February 2021
Founder's Day Message
On January 13, 1900, our founder, Margaret Polson Murray, began sending telegrams to the Mayors of Canada’s major cities asking that they invite influential women in their cities to come together to form an organization to support Canadian soldiers volunteering in the Boer War. The Mayor of Fredericton called a meeting on January 15 at which women gathered and began to raise money. After this first chapter started, Mrs. Murray renewed her efforts in Montreal and formed the second chapter. Further chapters were established across Canada thereafter. On Founder’s Day, we celebrate the optimism and vision of Mrs. Murray and think about the thousands of IODE women whose tireless efforts have contributed to making Canada a better place. During the past 121 years, IODE’s focus has broadened from supporting patriotism to become a registered charity dedicated to enhancing the quality of life for individuals through education support, community service and citizenship programs. With the social and economic changes of the last century, the percentage of women working outside the home has increased to over 80 per cent and women have less time to devote to charitable and volunteer activities. Along with the membership of other civic and volunteer groups, IODE membership is not increasing, but we should not let these statistics discourage us. There are still women who have an interest in meaningful volunteer work and have the time to dedicate to it. IODE is well-placed as a successful charity that can provide an organized structure and groups of committed women to work with in many Canadian communities. We continue to receive inquiries on our national website about membership and have bestowed a new chapter, IODE Evolve, during this past year. IODE has the flexibility in its structure to provide women with a platform that suits them for participating in charitable support and services in their communities. We also have capable members who are ready to help establish new chapters. During this past year, with Covid-19 interfering with all the usual things that we do, we have all experienced the frustration of trying to continue our usual IODE activities to raise funds for our projects and awards. We miss seeing other members of our chapters. We miss the tasty treats prepared by members to share at our meetings. We miss meeting the people in our communities at our open houses, our craft and rummage sales. Regardless of our frustrations, we have come up with ways to do things differently. We have figured out how to comply with safe distancing rules and still get together outdoors for meetings in good weather. We have learned how to use Zoom for virtual meeting and how to participate by talking to our iPads, tablets and computers. We have also discovered with the new world of work from home, that work no longer satisfies all our social needs and that our neighbourhoods and communities are increasingly important to us. How can IODE tap into this revival in community connectedness? We can invite neighbours to join our chapters when the lockdowns ease, allowing us to meet again. We can throw a nice and neighbourly get-together early in the fresh days of socializing and invite potential members. What should we do about the year that was? Write down our stories so we have them to share. When we look back on these challenging days. Tell the story of how we handled them and our mission to help others in need. Describe how we kept in touch with each other and helped our local food banks and shelters. Record the ideas we had for doing things differently to keep everyone safe. Celebrate our resilience! Please jot down notes to help remember what you did so we can share our stories on our websites, Facebook and Twitter. We had the imagination to continue to contribute during these difficult times and it is important to remember and record how we did it. Each year at this time, we think about our founder Mrs. Murray and how we can celebrate her mission to establish a patriotic women’s organization. Patriotism at that time was an expression of civic responsibility. Today, civic responsibility includes patriotic loyalty and means active participation in the public life of a community in an informed, committed, and constructive manner, with a focus on the common good. IODE has been honed by its members over the decades into a modern women’s organization that is the embodiment of these values. We continue to be strong and can meet the momentous Covid challenges that will continue into 2021. I find myself thinking these days of Norman Vincent Peale’s 1952 self-help book The Power of Positive Thinking. It helped me at various times to refocus and face challenges with a can-do attitude, and it is as relevant now as it was all those years ago. We can celebrate our resilience and keep positive in our day-to-day approach to life. Being upbeat in these anxious times is a significant demonstration of our civic engagement and our respect for others. Reaching out with kind greetings and warm telephone check-ins can dispel a bit of loneliness. Remember to be optimistic, to have a sense of humour and to laugh easily. We can certainly put smiles on people’s faces, even if they are behind facemasks. Carol McCall
President IODE Canada _________________________ IODE Canada Head Office 40 Orchard View Blvd., Suite 219 Toronto ON M4R 1B9 |
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22 May 2020
Address Of The National President at the National Annual Meeting
It is a privilege to be here today to talk to everyone who has joined for our first ever teleconferenced National Annual Meeting. Each of our provincial chapters has had its 2020 Annual Meeting by teleconference or Zoom and has completed its 2019 Annual Report despite being caught up in the chaos of the Covid-19 pandemic. I am extremely proud of the provincial officers who are serving IODE and have so effectively completed all our constitutional and governmental requirements. I congratulate and thank you all! Our accomplishments are reported in the 2019 Annual Report that was emailed to each of you. What a successful year! Reading our Annual Report about last year reveals a different world; a world where our primary chapters organized fund-raisers that have worked effectively year after year and also tried new fund-raisers that worked well. Most such chapter events were attended by many people and took place inside buildings. Thinking about these times emphasizes how different things now are. These days, we are facing a world with unique problems, caused by a pandemic unlike anything we have experienced in our lifetimes. During the past ten weeks, this self- isolation and the two metre distancing that circumscribes our lives has presented different and real challenges. Things will get better and get back to normal. Although it may well be a new normal, we will again enjoy each other’s company and be able to do IODE work in our communities. In the midst of this pandemic, “caring contacts”, Canadians writing letters, sharing stories and pet pictures, making regular check-in calls to people they know or have never met is helping keep people connected and feel they have not been abandoned. As we discussed at NAC in April and May, IODE women reach out to others in their communities. We help keep people well and provide emotional support. These small acts of kindness are something we can continue to do and do more of in these times. This contribution to others is valuable and, according to social workers and psychiatrists, makes a positive impact on the health and well-being of others. Give a smile to someone. Second Vice-President and Education Officer Karen Dalton told us about a staggering 1.7 million dollars, more than a $200,000 increase, of support that was expended in Services in 2019 and benefitted centres of all sizes in our communities. These included centres that provided addiction treatment, assisted young offenders, gave refuge to women suffering from domestic violence, operated recreation and sports programs, served the needs of seniors, children, homeless, persons with disabilities and others in need. IODE members provided these organizations with equipment, furnishings, clothing, bedding, personal items and food. In these times when our chapters have fewer financial resources, is there something else that we can do to assist those in great need? Who can we assist and how can we do it? This pandemic has shown us the seriousness of some social problems, in particular, homelessness, domestic violence against women and children and the state of many long-term care facilities in Canada. There are things that we can do that do not cost very much money. We have a voice and due to a change in the law in December, 2018, IODE and other charities can now engage in ‘public policy dialogues and development activities’. The activities must relate to one of our charitable purposes. One of our charitable purposes is ‘to forward such good work as may be for the relief of those in poverty or distress’. Homelessness, domestic violence and under-funded long-term care facilities all fall under the canopy of poverty and distress. What is it that we can do? We can seek to educate others and to influence the laws, policies and decisions of government. We can lobby for increased government funding for housing, women’s and children’s shelters and long-term care homes. When the Ontario Long-Term Care Homes Act came into force in 2010, the literature stated that it was ‘designed to help ensure that residents of long-term care homes receive safe, consistent, high-quality, resident-centred care’. Although that was the mandate, as we have seen, the reality in many homes is very different. Why is government monitoring the quality of service in long-term care facilities ineffective? We can monitor the governmental inquiries that are to be established and express our views about the importance of well-spent public funds delivering quality services to their residents. What about women’s shelters? According to today’s Globe, the turn-away rate at shelters across the country is about 70 per cent. A CBC investigation in 2019 found that more than 600 women and children were being rejected from these shelters every day. According to the editorial, the Government of Canada allocated about $26 million of more than $150 billion to approximately 550 women’s shelters in Canada, about $32,000 per shelter for adaptive measures for physical distancing and personal protective equipment for staff, and nothing to address the funding shortfall these shelters constantly face or to increase the number of spaces at these centres. Also, due to the pandemic, the shelters cannot hold their usual fund-raising activities! We can seek to educate and enlighten others about the need for our public funds to be better directed and monitored to achieve the alleviation of homelessness, to provide safe havens for abused women and children and to improve the quality of care in long-term care facilities. This new avenue for charities to effect change can also create a renewed sense of purpose within IODE, a fresh articulation of what we support, of what we believe in and value. In the past, IODE was involved in expressing the views of its membership on political issues, including its support of patriotism and the British Empire. When IODE became a registered charity, although IODE could still support citizenship, political activities were curtailed because charities were prohibited from engaging in any political activity. The Income Tax Act still prohibits a charity from devoting any part of its resources to the direct or indirect support of, or opposition to, any political party or candidate for public office. But now, a charity is permitted to advocate for changes to laws, policies and decisions of government that would further its stated charitable purpose. In addition to alleviating poverty and distress, IODE could also engage in advocacy regarding laws, policies and decisions of government affecting education and the arts. We remain a strong and resilient group of women and at just under 2,000 members we have the power to make a difference. How we do that and whether we decide to add advocacy and trying to influence laws, policies and peoples’ opinions to our activities is ours to discuss and decide. Like our other programs, one size does not fit all chapters, and, as long as our values of honesty, fairness, respect and giving of ourselves to others underpin every activity we undertake, we can offer chapters variety in the vision of what IODE is about. Because the areas in which we might advocate about the expenditure of government funds are all areas within provincial jurisdiction, there would definitely be variations in the focus of provincial chapters. We can evolve and add advocating to effect changes in laws, policies and programs, and in these days of vibrant social media, we have seen how effective a voice can be. The big impact we would hope to achieve would be better use of public money in providing for social needs. This idea is one we can think about during these challenging times. I think that the new normal will have us all thinking in any event and we should take a look at whether we want to try to make a difference in a different way. Engaging in public education and advocacy about the benefits of enhanced and better spent government funding to relieve poverty and distress may well appeal to younger women and attract them as members. Before ending my talk, I want to remind you that last year we set up a new fund, Together for Tomorrow. It is open to members and others to assist with the operational costs of IODE, to build a capital fund to support the legacy of IODE, to allow individuals to further support IODE and to receive income tax receipts for their donations. It is important to be able to afford keeping in place our operational structure. I also want to thank the 2019-2020 National Officers and Convenors. You are an exceptional group of caring and talented women who have worked together effectively as a team. Thank you. Carol McCall President IODE Canada _________________________ IODE Canada Head Office 40 Orchard View Blvd., Suite 219 Toronto ON M4R 1B9 03 April 2020
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We are all looking for something positive in the COVID-19 pandemic chaos that surrounds us. We are all trying to do our best to support our families and friends. IODE members work at helping individuals in their communities and across Canada.
I want to thank officers in all chapters for their thoughts and actions that have ensured that IODE continues to operate from Coast to Coast to Coast. They have responded to the crisis in a most effective manner to support IODE. Thank you to officers for writing and submitting annual reports as national and provincial officers are busy reading and learning from your reports. Officers know that IODE is important to members and this commitment to its future is outstanding! The telephone, teleconference services, internet, emails, websites and other social media are allowing us to maintain contact with each other and continue meeting. These are our tools and IODE is using them well! At the national office two dedicated employees, Mary and Roma, have gone above and beyond expectations in delivering essential information to our officers and committees and in converting the office operation to a remote one. Both are working remotely from home answers phone calls and emails. Similarly, IODE Ontario’s employee, Susan, is supporting the Ontario officers with tireless assistance while working through this crisis. Times like this highlight the exceptional commitment of staff and I thank them on behalf of officers and members. During my usual morning coffee and reading of the GLOBE, the editorial page I found gold! The editorial referred to WW II and Winston Churchill’s radio messages inspiring people to meet the challenges facing them. I cannot express positive thoughts about what we can do any better than those that the GLOBE editor wrote. This editorial in THE GLOBE AND MAIL refers to the wasted opportunity of government to call upon Canadians to do what is right and what is necessary. Here is the message to Canadians: “We will overcome this trial because our country has triumphed over adversity in the past. Canadians will show courage, generosity and solidarity in a crisis. And we will willingly and selflessly forego our usual freedoms and comforts if given well-enunciated reasons. Such as: To not give aid to an unseen enemy by becoming its agent of transmission. To save the lives of doctors, nurses and other health care workers, and give hospitals breathing room to properly care for the sick. To give governments time to acquire needed medical equipment. To give researchers time to develop antibodies and, eventually, a vaccine. To protect Mom and Dad, Grandma and Grandpa. To bring us closer to the day when children can go back to school. To allow a restart of the economy as soon as possible.” The editorial suggests that earnestness and patriotism are not very fashionable anymore. We in IODE value both! We have done so for more than 120 years. Please help beat this silent invisible foe and keep your spirits up while staying at home. IODE has already survived WW I, the Spanish flu epidemic, WW II, numerous economic debacles, and we will survive this time too. Stay well, stay healthy and if at all possible, stay home. Carol McCall President IODE Canada _________________________ IODE Canada Head Office 40 Orchard View Blvd., Suite 219 Toronto ON M4R 1B9 |
Founder's Day Message 202013 February 2020
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Founder Mrs. Clark Polson Murray
IODE began 120 years ago on 13 January when Margaret Polson Murray, a Montrealer, sent telegrams to the mayors of Canada’s major cities asking that they invite influential women in their cities to come together to form an organization to support Canadian soldiers in the Boer War. Women agreed at a meeting called by the Mayor of Fredericton on 15 January to get together and began to raise money. With one chapter started, Mrs. Murray renewed her efforts in Montreal and formed the second chapter. Further chapters were established and IODE quickly grew across Canada. On Founder’s Day we celebrate the inspiration and tenacity of Mrs. Murray and think about the thousands of IODE women whose tireless efforts have contributed to making Canada a better place. During the past 120 years, IODE’s focus has broadened. Although supporting patriotism remains an important IODE value, we are now a charity ‘dedicated to enhancing the quality of life for individuals through education support, community service and citizenship programs.’
Many charities were built on the voluntary labour of women and IODE is such a charity. Social and economic changes have led to more women having full time employment during the past 50 years, and with increased demands on women’s time, something had to give. Volunteer activities are the ones often left out of the busy schedule. Yet, according to a 2018 report from The Conference Board of Canada, 43.6 per cent of Canadians do volunteer work. Younger Canadians had high participation rates and those aged 55 and over contributed disproportionately to a much higher number of hours on average. Although the growth in volunteering is roughly one third of the pace of population growth, it was calculated that over 13,000,000 people volunteered in 2018! This report also values volunteer time at $27 per hour, the average hourly rate in the core non-profit sector. In 2018, IODE members’ 431,874 volunteer hours would have a value of $11,660,598! Volunteering is more than the economic value of the time: it is the participation of women who care with other people and the satisfaction of giving of ourselves to our communities to make a positive difference.
How can IODE tap into the volunteering activity of women? If there is room for volunteer time, working women with school-age children volunteer, but mostly to organizations serving children’s needs. Can IODE chapters offer activities that serve children’s needs and in which children can participate to attract these younger women to become members? LITERACY FOR CITIZENSHIP in New Brunswick is a program that increases awareness of IODE’s concern about the development of children’s values. There can be more such programs across Canada. Having students help with our community activities gives students an opportunity to fulfil their volunteering requirements at school. Maybe their mothers can be involved too. We can develop ideas for Citizenship programs that would appeal to women caring for school-age children.
What about women who have retired from their working careers? We know that these women are major volunteers of their time. We can be there for them offering an organized opportunity for volunteering in our communities. They can do as much or as little as they wish. Attendance at meeting is not required. Most people volunteer because they want to do something that makes a positive contribution to their community. That contribution through IODE can be volunteering time, donating goods or donating money or doing some of each. We have a broad scope within which to develop new ways of engaging potential new members. We have the imagination to think of doing our volunteer work in new ways that would have appeal to younger women.
We have had a successful past with a thriving membership, but we are having challenges maintaining our membership numbers. Many of the reasons for loss of existing members are natural ones. The issue we face is how to find new members. Since August, eighteen women have contacted us through our IODE Canada website expressing interest in what we are doing and in joining us as members. Although that is not a big number, these inquiries show that if women have information about us, they may well be interested in looking more closely.
How do we reach out to women in our communities? We just need to contact one, or preferably two, women at a time. We can provide them with an overwhelming amount of information about IODE. We have websites that tell the story of who we are and what we do. We have Facebook and Twitter for sharing information about our events and projects. We have Echoes issues and printed brochures that we can hand out to potential members to read at home. We can invite them as guests to our meetings or events. Our founder Mrs. Murray started from zero members! We have the advantage of having almost 2,000 members and a solid reputation as a women’s charity. We can grow our membership by individual members reaching out to women in their communities. Let’s focus on how they can have fun, meet new friends and make a positive difference. Let’s celebrate our rich history and our accomplishments and involve new members in our IODE story.
Carol McCall
National President
13 February 2020
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Many charities were built on the voluntary labour of women and IODE is such a charity. Social and economic changes have led to more women having full time employment during the past 50 years, and with increased demands on women’s time, something had to give. Volunteer activities are the ones often left out of the busy schedule. Yet, according to a 2018 report from The Conference Board of Canada, 43.6 per cent of Canadians do volunteer work. Younger Canadians had high participation rates and those aged 55 and over contributed disproportionately to a much higher number of hours on average. Although the growth in volunteering is roughly one third of the pace of population growth, it was calculated that over 13,000,000 people volunteered in 2018! This report also values volunteer time at $27 per hour, the average hourly rate in the core non-profit sector. In 2018, IODE members’ 431,874 volunteer hours would have a value of $11,660,598! Volunteering is more than the economic value of the time: it is the participation of women who care with other people and the satisfaction of giving of ourselves to our communities to make a positive difference.
How can IODE tap into the volunteering activity of women? If there is room for volunteer time, working women with school-age children volunteer, but mostly to organizations serving children’s needs. Can IODE chapters offer activities that serve children’s needs and in which children can participate to attract these younger women to become members? LITERACY FOR CITIZENSHIP in New Brunswick is a program that increases awareness of IODE’s concern about the development of children’s values. There can be more such programs across Canada. Having students help with our community activities gives students an opportunity to fulfil their volunteering requirements at school. Maybe their mothers can be involved too. We can develop ideas for Citizenship programs that would appeal to women caring for school-age children.
What about women who have retired from their working careers? We know that these women are major volunteers of their time. We can be there for them offering an organized opportunity for volunteering in our communities. They can do as much or as little as they wish. Attendance at meeting is not required. Most people volunteer because they want to do something that makes a positive contribution to their community. That contribution through IODE can be volunteering time, donating goods or donating money or doing some of each. We have a broad scope within which to develop new ways of engaging potential new members. We have the imagination to think of doing our volunteer work in new ways that would have appeal to younger women.
We have had a successful past with a thriving membership, but we are having challenges maintaining our membership numbers. Many of the reasons for loss of existing members are natural ones. The issue we face is how to find new members. Since August, eighteen women have contacted us through our IODE Canada website expressing interest in what we are doing and in joining us as members. Although that is not a big number, these inquiries show that if women have information about us, they may well be interested in looking more closely.
How do we reach out to women in our communities? We just need to contact one, or preferably two, women at a time. We can provide them with an overwhelming amount of information about IODE. We have websites that tell the story of who we are and what we do. We have Facebook and Twitter for sharing information about our events and projects. We have Echoes issues and printed brochures that we can hand out to potential members to read at home. We can invite them as guests to our meetings or events. Our founder Mrs. Murray started from zero members! We have the advantage of having almost 2,000 members and a solid reputation as a women’s charity. We can grow our membership by individual members reaching out to women in their communities. Let’s focus on how they can have fun, meet new friends and make a positive difference. Let’s celebrate our rich history and our accomplishments and involve new members in our IODE story.
Carol McCall
National President
13 February 2020
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