Difficult Everyday Life of Pandemic Voluntary Service (Research Report)

Abstract

In 2020, as part of the municipal “mikroDOTACJE”, we conducted a study of the #SzczecinPomaga campaign on how local government and non-governmental institutions dealt with helping the inhabitants of this city during the lockdown forced by the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic. One of the elements of this research were interviews with coordinators of institutions involved in aid activities undertaken as part of this campaign. Most of the questions that we’ve asked our respondents concerned broadly understood volunteering. We asked about the methods of searching and recruiting volunteers and the methods of organizing their activities in the difficult coronavirus reality. In May 2021 (exactly one year later), we repeated these interviews and found out how the coordinators assess the situation of Szczecin’s voluntary service after two consecutive waves of the pandemic and holiday “lockdowns”. We look at the problem from the point of view of the practice of coordinating aid activities, relations with volunteers, as well as opinions on their commitment and willingness to help.1