Volunteer Expo 2007 - The Aftermath

This past Saturday, February 11th, we put on the biggest event we do all year (and the largest of its kind in America) - our second annual Hands On Twin Cities Volunteer Expo at MOA.

Soon - possibly even later today [it actually took us until the next day - ed.] - there will be a webpage posted on handsontwincities.org detailing the happenings of the event, and featuring lots of eye-catching pictures.

Until then, we thought we'd use the blog to list a few observations and lessons learned from this year's Expo, in no particular order:

• As an experienced volunteer center, we have long stood by the "rule" which states that about 80% of registered volunteers will actually show up for a service project. On Saturday, the person who devised this statistic was once again proved to be a genius. Exactly 80% of our registered event volunteers arrived to make the Expo happen!
• Hip-hop dance teams (courtesty of Neighborhood House) are a total crowd-pleaser.
• The North Suburban Chorus showed us that we remember far too many of the lyrics to Disney songs, as we were able to sing along with "Bippity-Boppity-Boo" in its' entirety.
• Single Volunteers of the Twin Cities are the friendliest, most efficient team of volunteers an event organizer could ever hope for.
• When there is an act on stage, and a big-screen projection of said act is right next to the stage, we can't help but watch the screen, regardless of the fact that we're 20 feet away. Why do we do that?
• Meticulously planning for an event for 3 months and having 2 heart attacks per week seems worth it when the big day arrives and everything runs smoothly.