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  Sign up for UB CORE

By KEVIN FRYLING

Published: October 1, 2008

UB employees interested in offering a helping hand to their neighbors, both on campus and throughout the Buffalo area, can sign up for the UB Community OutReach for Employees Program—or UB CORE—a new program established by the Wellness and Work/Life Balance unit in University Human Resources.

UB CORE was created in April to help members of the UB community learn about local opportunities for volunteerism via occasional email updates and notifications.

“Our goal is to provide people who want more opportunities to volunteer with a chance to become involved at the institutional level, and at their own personal level of commitment,” says Kathie Frier, director of wellness and work/life balance. “By identifying opportunities and notifying people centrally, everyone wins.”

She says about 100 employees already have joined UB CORE, and volunteers have participated in a number of events, including helping incoming students move into UB’s residence halls, a project to garden and clean up planters in the middle of Main Street across from Allen Hall on the South Campus, and UB Paints, a collaborative project led by UB’s Students for Urban Renewal and Office of Community Relations that improved neighborhood conditions along Englewood Avenue in the University Heights neighborhood.

“UB employees are traditionally very generous with their time,” says Frier, “but we also want to get to the people who are not the usual people who volunteer, the ones who have always wanted to become more involved but aren’t active right now.”

Companies such as Disney, Nike and Wegmans also place a strong emphasis on community service and volunteerism, she adds, noting that a sense of personal fulfillment, pride in one’s institution and a chance to meet fellow employees are just a few of the benefits of participation in community volunteer activities.

“While we’re mainly focusing on opportunities that are aligned with the mission of the university, we also want to be able to provide a large corps of UB volunteers to assist in any ‘disaster’ cleanup operations,” she says. “On many occasions, people want to help but don't know how to begin.”