Needs From: Greater Longview United Way

Poverty is a reality for many individuals, but unless you've experienced poverty, it's difficult to truly understand. A poverty simulation bridges that gap from misconception to understanding. A poverty simulation an interactive immersion experience. It sensitizes community participants to the realities of poverty by promoting poverty awareness, increasing understanding, inspiring local change, and transforming perspectives.

The information session will cover the struggles many individuals and families in our community face, followed by an interactive simulation. During the simulation, each participant will be assigned a role in a "family" in which family members will problem-solve how to pay for mortgage/rent, utilities, food, and transportation with limited resources. The information session and simulation will last three hours. Individuals who serve on the board of a nonprofit organization, work with lower-income employees, are involved in volunteer service, or are in a faith community will benefit from this experience.

No skills or talents are required for participation, only a willingness to learn from others and the simulation experience.

Volunteer mentors are the foundation of the Aspire Mentoring Program. Currently, we have a waitlist of local children waiting to match with a mentor to care for, guide, and support them. While we offer our New Mentor Orientations (NMOs) on a regular basis, we'd like to have a special community NMO on Wed, May 6th, 11:30 am-1:30 pm at Maude Cobb to coincide with GLUW's Week of Action. We are also very excited to share that this will be the first time we will offer our training in Spanish as well as English! There is no obligation to mentor after attending, but our goal is to have a large percentage of attendees continue the process to get cleared and become a volunteer mentor with us.

New Mentor Orientation is a 2-hour, evidence-based interactive training for prospective Aspire mentors. Our vision is to gather everyone together for the first part of the training, and then break out into two groups to offer both English and Spanish instruction. Our NMOs include videos, discussion, mentoring scenarios, and ample time for questions. NMOs are constructed to give attendees a basic knowledge of Positive Youth Development (PYD), and a strengths-based approach to working with children and families.

Help The Martin House Children's Advocacy Center by collecting donations for their agency. Great places to gather donations include your business, workplace, church, or from family and friends. The following is a list of their current needs:

Hand Sanitizer, Individually Wrapped Snacks, Small Toys, Gatorade or other Sports Drinks (small bottles), Bottled Water, Menstrual Products (pads of all sizes), individually packaged wipes, and travel-size hand sanitizer.

Help The Martin House Children's Advocacy Center by collecting donations for their agency. Great places to gather donations include your business, workplace, church, or from family and friends. The following is a list of their current needs:

Individually Wrapped Snacks, Individual Drinks such as Capri Sun, Yoo Hoo, soft drinks, juice, water, etc.

Help Parenting Resource Center of East Texas by collecting donations for their agency. Great places to gather donations include your business, workplace, church, or from family and friends. The following is a list of their current needs:

Copy Paper, Color Copy Paper, Stamps, Disinfecting Wipes, Three-brad folders with pockets in various colors.

Copy Paper, Color Copy Paper, and Three-Brad Folders will be used for their Home Front, Family Matters, and Co-Parenting/Divorcing class folders. 

Help East Texas CASA by collecting donations for their agency. Great places to gather donations include your business, workplace, church, or from family and friends. The following is a list of their current needs:

Disinfecting Wipes, Spray Cleaner (Lysol or Similar), Baby Wipes, Coloring or Activity Books, Map colors or fine tip markers for adult coloring books (teenagers)

Help Longview Community Ministries by collecting donations for their agency. Great places to gather donations include your business, workplace, church, or from family and friends. The following is a list of their current needs:

Stamps, Hand Sanitizer, Individually Wrapped Snacks, Coloring or Activity Books, Laundry Soap

Help Longview Community Ministries by collecting donations for their agency. Great places to gather donations include your business, workplace, church, or from family and friends. The following is a list of their current needs:

Copy Paper, Color Copy Paper, Manila Folders, Pens, Pencils, Post-it Notes, Stamps, Disinfecting Wipes, Toiletries (Full Size), Toiletries (Travel Size)

While all donations are welcome, they particularly need toiletries at this time, due to low stock. Shampoo, Conditioner, and Body Soap are greatly needed.

Help Boys & Girls Clubs of the Big Pines by collecting donations for their agency. Great places to gather donations include your business, workplace, church, or from family and friends. The following is a list of their current needs:

Paper Plates, Individually Wrapped Snacks, Crayons, Individually packaged condiments (ranch, ketchup, honey, jelly), Construction paper, Notebook paper, Paper cups, Plastic forks and spoons

Help Pathstones Counseling Center by collecting donations for their agency. Great places to gather donations include your business, workplace, church, or from family and friends. The following is a list of their current needs:

Copy paper, toilet paper, paper towels, Kleenex, cleaning wipes, toilet bowl cleaner, pump hand soap

Volunteers are needed to decorate food collection barrels for Longview Community Ministries. These barrels will be distributed to various locations to aid in food collections. This project will not only help promote LCM's programs, but also express its gratitude for donations.

This project can be completed 9 am - 2 pm on Friday, May 1st, or any business day during the week of May 4th - May 8th. Please include your availability in the response notes when you register.

5-7 volunteers are needed to assemble boxes, make snack bags, clean, sort the boxes, and organize the food pantry at Longview Community Ministries.

This project can be completed 12:30 pm - 2 pm on Friday, May 1st, or any business day during the week of May 4th - May 8th. Please include your availability in the response notes when you register.

3-4 volunteers are needed to help to paint the guest bathroom, offices, and other rooms at Longview Community Ministries. The outcome is to improve the areas for guests and clients.

This project can be completed 12:30 pm - 2 pm on Friday, May 1st, or any business day during the week of May 4th - May 8th. Please include your availability in the response notes when you register.

Volunteers are needed to sort the coats and other supplies used in the 2026 Coats for Kids clothing drive. This involves getting the coats from storage, unloading the coats, sorting the coats, taking inventory, and then boxing the coats according to size and gender. Approximately 8-10 people are needed for 3-4 hours.

This project can be completed 9 am - 2 pm on Friday, May 1st, or any business day during the week of May 4th - May 8th. Please include your availability in the response notes when you register.

8-10 volunteers are needed to help to paint four offices at East Texas CASA. Painting around baseboards and door/window openings, so previous painting experience is preferred.

This project can be completed 8 am - 2 pm during Week of Action (May 1st - May 8th), including Saturday, May 2nd. Please include your availability in the response notes when you register.

Volunteers will clean up the flowerbeds and hedges on the Club property. Clean-up only. No planting. 

This project can be completed 8 am - 2 pm on Friday, May 1st; Tuesday, May 5th; Thursday, May 7th;  or Friday, May 8th. Monday, May 4th; Saturday, May 2nd; and Wednesday, May 6th are NOT available. Please include your availability in the response notes when you register.

With Summer Camp around the corner, Gilmont staff are working hard to prepare to welcome about 400 campers and 32 Summer Staff and to cultivate a safe, sacred space where all are invited. Volunteers are needed to help assemble Summer Staff Manuals, Bible Study Curriculum, and Emergency Action Plan folders for staff to use throughout the summer. All material will be prepared in advance, but assistance is needed to organize and assemble each resource into categorized folders. These resource folders provide essential guidance for Gilmont's Summer Staff team as they nurture the physical, social, emotional, and spiritual lives of campers throughout Day Camp and Overnight Camp.

This project can be completed 1 pm - 5 pm on Monday, May 4th; Wednesday, May 6th; or Thursday, May 7th. Friday, May 1st; Tuesday, May 5th; Saturday, May 2nd; and Friday, May 8th are NOT available. Please include your availability in the response notes when you register.

Due to the nature of working with pronged folders, this project may not be suitable for younger kids.

A great way for individuals to participate is by donating items from our general needs list. This is a list we created to meet the needs of multiple agencies. All items from the general needs collection will be sorted and distributed to our partner agencies following Week of Action.

Our general needs list includes the following:

Please contact Hegan Rotondo at hrotondo@longviewunitedway.org to make arrangements to deliver your donations. 

We don't want to miss any of the "action". Help us capture moments such as the morning celebration, our hard-working volunteers, donation drop-offs, and more during our annual Week of Action. 

If you have any questions, contact Heather Stevenson at hstevenson@longviewunitedway.org.