21st Century Volunteers, Ep. 8 Thriving on the Prairie

Sue Milender, NDSU Extension agent in Barnes County, talks with North Dakota 4-H volunteer development specialist Rachelle Vettern about what volunteers and volunteerism look like in the 21st century.
Transcript
Sue Milender: Welcome to Thriving on the Prairie, a podcast exploring issues concerning families and communities that inspires North Dakota movers and shakers and community makers to engage in lifelong learning. I'm Sue Milender. I'm Barnes county extension agent. And today I'm honored to introduce you to Rachelle Vettern who is a professor and the leadership and volunteer development specialist for North Dakota State University. In her extension role, she conducts research and provides education for both youth and adults in the areas of leadership, ethics, generations, youth development and volunteer development. You know, she works in both the NDSU Extension Center for 4-H Youth Development as well as family and community wellness. In her faculty role she teaches online classes for Great Plains IDEA I-D-E-A youth development master's program. You are busy Rachelle. She has her B.A. in psychology and an M.S. in counseling and human resource resource development sorry, from South Dakota State University and her PhD is in counselor education and supervision from NDSU. And she lives in Hawley with their 17 year old son and 13 year old daughter, Emily, like I said, we're sure you are really busy.
Rachelle Vettern: Well, thank you, I appreciate you reading all of that I didn't know how much I should share with you. So thanks. Um, yeah, it's fun to talk to you on this Finally, Sunny spring day with all sorts of exciting things happening, our 4-H club meetings are starting or groups are starting to meet face to face and spring sports is happening. So it's great to have a chance to chat.
Sue: I know and you know, 4-H season is gearing up. And I as a 4-H coordinator in Barnes County, I’m calling all sorts of volunteers to the task of judging and looking at different projects. And so I've been doing some reading on volunteerism and I what I've noticed, Rachelle, is that it has really changed. So the book that I've been reading is called, The New Breed: Understanding and Equipping the 21st Century Volunteer, by Jonathan and Thomas McKee. And what what captured my attention was the 21st century volunteer not, you know, I'll be the very first to admit I'm old. And when I think of volunteering, I think of gosh, I've got to commit my firstborn when I volunteer, because I'm there for life. And I actually took a step back, and I was calling all these volunteers. And Rachelle, I was getting so frustrated, because I was like, Oh, these aren't the same kind of volunteers and, and attitudes that I had back in the day, or that my mom demonstrated for me back in the day. And so I thought, well, where are these passionate volunteers? And then of course, as we all do, I went into this defense mode. And I said, well, it's not my fault. Everyone is so busy and sports consume people. And, gosh, there isn't time to turn around, let volunteer. But then I started reading this book. And Rachelle, I realized, gosh, it is my fault that I am not reaching these volunteers because times have changed. And the way people want to volunteer has evolved in this 21st century. So I'm not alone in this. I know that there are lots of people who are trying to gather volunteers, churches and civic organizations and schools. And that's why I thought it's so important for us to understand what the 21st century volunteer looks like. And so that's why I'm interested in talking to you and finding out how you can, you know, steer us in the right direction so that we can gather all these wonderful people.
Rachelle: I am excited to talk with you about this too, because it is such an important subject. And I don't want to say gone is that are the days of that 30 year volunteer, but it it volunteering does look different for just the reasons that you talked about. We ar