For students and residents looking to give back to the community, one organization in the city of Binghamton offers a few different opportunities, all promoting a healthy lifestyle.
Faith in Action, which offers a Binghamton branch, is a group “designed to come together and help elderly and chronically ill residents in the local community,” according to Francine Urda, a director of one of the organization’s sub-programs.
The group was established in the city 12 years ago, and is an offset of the national Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, Faith in Action Program Director Joanne Kays said. The Foundation works to “improve the health and health care of all Americans,” according to its Web site, and has 700 programs like Faith in Action all across the country.
“[The foundation] is geared toward giving grants to health care programs across the county,” Kays said.
Binghamton’s chapter of Faith in Action has 300 registered volunteers who work with approximately 400 clients.
According to Kays, typical clients can be “visually challenged, have mobility issues, are hard of hearing, have memory impairment, diabetes or can be perfectly healthy but just lonely.”
The goal of the organization is to help these residents with “non-medical assistance,” Urda said.
“The volunteers are given a variety of things to do,” she said. “Volunteers’ tasks are things like driving a client to a doctor’s appointment, filling out paperwork, doing yard work or just visiting so the client has some company to talk to.”
Within the city’s branch of Faith in Action exists a sub-program called the Healthier Lifestyle Mentoring Program, of which Urda is the director. The Mentoring Program has been a part of the chapter for 2.5 years, and is tailored to a more particular aspect of Faith in Action’s goals, she said.
The program, according to Urda, is designed to help clients “create and live a healthier lifestyle.” It does so by providing clients, who are mostly diabetics, with nutrition information necessary to lead a healthier lifestyle.
The group also makes permanent matches between volunteer and client, she added.
“This way clients can have a closer connection with their volunteer in order to track the client’s progress and help them with their particular needs,” Urda said.
A new six-week program at a local senior center is the next project for the subgroup, Urda said. The program will be located at the East Hills Senior Living Community’s common area.
The project will consist of chair exercises for wheelchair-bound clients and simple cooking lessons — activities that Urda said not only help the patrons, but also allow the volunteers to have a “good feeling inside.” The experience is a very “rewarding” one, she said.
Because of the benefits to both volunteers and receiving individuals, Urda said it’s important to find more volunteers to help the cause.
Kays also said the organization needs more people in the community to lend a hand so it can reach its goals.
New volunteers are asked to fill out paperwork and attend an orientation session before they begin working, and Kays encouraged new volunteers to send her an e-mail at jkays@broomecouncil.net.