“It is an absolutely pleasure to work with my scholars. To be able to guide them and give them the advice I was never given. It’s a wonderful feeling!”

Felicity Kean – HMEF support coach since 2016

Our dedicated volunteers are the backbone of what we do. We simply could not exist without them. We have over 100 people who regularly volunteer their time and expertise to support scholarship recipients. It is our coaches that truly make our scholarship unique. They support our girls to overcome barriers to success and imagine a future beyond their current experience.

Other volunteers help us select scholarship recipients, find additional funding to support more scholarship recipients, communicate with donors and stakeholders, bring our stories to the Australian public and provide enrichment opportunities for scholarship recipients to learn more about future careers.

How you can get involved!

As a Coach

We provide coaching support for each scholarship recipient. Students from disadvantaged backgrounds often have limited access to role models or mentors beyond their parents or teachers. Often with lower levels of education or limited work histories themselves, many of these parents or carers can find it difficult to talk about the range of opportunities available for the future.

Students are matched with a supportive adult who becomes their coach. Volunteer coaches are often experienced educators or passionate about the importance of education.  All coaches are screened, inducted and then carefully matched with a student according to the student’s career aspirations and interests. Coaches will contact scholars no less than once a month to discuss:

• Academic progress
• Career aspirations
• Tertiary education aspirations
• Subject selection
• Use of scholarship tools
• General attitude towards education

Coaches will work with scholars to establish the mode of communication that works best for the scholars. The coaches contact students via email, phone, social media, or a message application. If a coach and student agree to meet in person, they will do so in the presence of a responsible adult who can sign that the scholar was safe for the period of the coaching session.

Administration, Marketing and Community Development

We need people for all kinds of roles : processing scholarship applications; processing donations; accounting; marketing for donations; managing social media; digital media; administration support; research, etc. Here is a link to our current advertisement on Seek Volunteer.

One of our most recent initiative is unfolding over the next 6 months and involves local community members and businesses supporting our girls. We’re recruiting community advocates to help us grow our community participation and general awareness of the need for our scholarships in local communities. Find out more here.

As a Tutor, Career Adviser and Subject Choice Adviser

Face to Face Tutoring (or via Skype) is critical for the girls’ advancement. To supplement the tutors we are paying for, we are looking for v Face to Face Tutoring (or via Skype) is critical for the girls’ advancement. To supplement the tutors we are paying for, we are looking for volunteers to tutor the students in a variety of subjects. We also need volunteers to help the girls explore pathways to careers as well as select subjects that will get them to the course they want to pursue in tertiary education.

For more information email the team at info@hardingmiller.org.au