There are two ways you can help: money and time.
Donations
Although our time is given freely, there are many continuing expenses that the
Association has to meet. These include:
- Replacing our USB flash drives and postal wallets as they fail or wear out, plus labels and pouches;
- Renewal of recording equipment, laptop computers and USB flash drive duplicators;
- USB flash memory players for listeners who need them;
- Stationery, postage, batteries and other sundry items;
- Rental of storage space and AGM costs.
We do receive generous support from a number of sponsors but we are
always grateful for donations no matter how small. As a registered charity we can accept tax efficient
donations via CAF (give as you earn).
Volunteers
We are always pleased to hear from people wishing to join the Association as volunteers. There are
several ways you can help:
- Join one of our news teams as a reader. Each team meets for one Friday evening approximately every
seven weeks, and the recording usually takes less than two hours. We also have some reserve readers
who can stand in when regulars are away. You must be able to read fluently from newsprint, have good
diction and have a reasonably strong voice (i.e. not too breathy). If you would like to become a
reader you will be assigned to one of the teams for a trial, and we'll take it from there.
- Could you form a new reading team? You’d need an editor and four readers, though usually the editor
is one of the readers. You'd also need a suitable location for the recordings - generally the home of one of you.
Training will be provided, and your recording technician will be able to guide you through the session.
- The editor is responsible for getting the Advertiser and selecting the items to be read by each of the readers.
More information can be found here.
- If Fridays are out of the question you may be able to join one of the monthly magazine teams.
- Join as a recording technician (sound recordist). Our rcordists work on a roster with all of the teams so
you will have one session every six weeks or so. It will help if you have some experience of sound recording
though not necessarily at a professional level. You should also have some experience of personal computers
preferably with the Windows operating system. Training with our equipment will be given. You will need your own
transport and be prepared to deliver the equipment to the engineer for the next edition †.
- Join the “Thursday Team” which is responsible for collecting the returned media, logging them
in and preparing both media and postal wallets for the next copying session on the following Saturday.
- Join the “Saturday Team” which duplicates each week's news and the monthly magazine, carries out quality control
checks, inserts the thumb drives into the wallets and delivers them to the Royal Mail delivery office in Stafferton Way.
We may not be able to fit you into our rosters straight away but we always like to have
volunteers ready to step in when the need arises. All the sessions are held in the Maidenhead area.
You will find a bit more about the rôles within the Association on the What
We Do pages.
† We welcome visually impaired volunteers and are happy to make special arrangements for them.
If you can help please contact our Secretary:
Mrs Fay Poate (e-mail)
7 Whitchurch Close, Maidenhead, Berkshire. SL6 7TZ
01628 781870
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