Kitchen Volunteer

At Noah’s Ark, we are incredibly fortunate to have a fantastic catering team who prepare delicious food for all of our guests and staff, all of which is heavily supported by volunteers. Kitchen volunteers support our catering manager with the day-to-day running of the hospice kitchen, helping to prepare food, serve customers and keeping our kitchen clean and tidy to the highest standard.

We are looking for more Kitchen Volunteers to support us, with regular and ad-hoc shifts available

Main tasks/activities: Assisting the Catering Manager in preparing, cooking, and serving food and refreshments to families, staff, other volunteers, and visitors to The Ark.

• food preparation
• serving at the front counter
• taking money
• restocking fridge and supplies
• cleaning and tidying up

Qualities/ experience/ skills needed:

• A willingness and ability to stand for extended periods of time
• You must enjoy interacting with children and be happy to roll your sleeves up and help with a variety of activities, some which are more ‘fun’ than others.
• Experience of working with children, young people or families is desirable but not essential.
• Good communication skills and ability to work well with others
• Reliability, commitment and engagement
• Patience and understanding, helpful, sensitive and compassionate manner is paramount
• A good level of self-awareness

We welcome volunteers from all backgrounds with all sorts of skills.

Opportunities with this role:

• Gain experience working with children
• Gain experience working with people with disabilities
• Build social skills through a variety of interactions
• Develop abilities to work as part of a team
• Gain a Level 2 Food Safety & Hygiene qualification

Interviews, training and assessment process:

At Noah’s Ark, we value volunteer support, but we are also aware that not all roles are suitable for everyone. The interview and training process is in place to ensure that the Noah’s Ark staff get to know more about you, that you are given the correct training for the role and that you can find out if this is a role you would like to undertake. The training process is as follows:

• Volunteer Information Session: All potential volunteers have to attend an information sessions to gain a better understanding of the charity and what we do.
• Informal interview: This will take place at the Noah’s Ark office at a mutually agreeable time.
• Core module (full day): Held on a Saturday or Sunday, training topics include Confidentiality and Boundaries, giving excellent customer service, grief, loss and bereavement, and infection control.
• Safeguarding Module (3 hours): Held on a weekday evening, depending on the schedule. Essential for ensuring the safety of our service.
• Level 2 Food Safety & Hygiene – an online training session arranged by Noah’s Ark.