Back to Nov. 2019 Newsletter

A New Tool

By Anna Restuccia and Meredith Stoops

In the summer of 2019, Benedictine College and numerous organizations in Atchison signed onto GivePulse, an online network designed to strengthen the connection between community members who have time and talent to offer with those people or agencies who would benefit from their support. As described on www.givepulse.com, the site does this through a user-friendly platform that allows organizations to “organize, schedule, and manage a database of information on their volunteers” with convenience and accessibility. Many individuals and non-profits in Atchison have already put this tool to work and have started to see its benefits.

Abbie Perdue works as Community Resource Development Director for Riverbend Habitat for Humanity. When asked about the improvements in Habitat for Humanity since it signed onto GivePulse, Perdue enthusiastically stated that “for us…one of the biggest perks of GivePulse is tracking those impact hours.” Ease in tracking such information allows for more time spent recruiting, planning, and organizing future home-improvement activities in the area. The GivePulse interface documents information quickly and effortlessly, allowing Perdue to compare records of past events in order to more accurately project for future goals. She is confident of continued organizational improvement with the new website and is excited to see further benefits as more community members get active.

As a user of GivePulse for a service-learning class and as the Student Government Association Director of Clubs, Benedictine student, Wyatt Iseman, can vouch for the site’s convenience in reaching out to community members. Iseman expressed that he felt an initial hesitation in using the new website to its full capacity, but that vanished with repetitive use, as with any platform such as Facebook or Instagram. In repeating how the concept was first explained to him, Iseman described GivePulse as “almost a social network for Service-Learning within an institution,” which for him creates a visual for how an organization “is all connected.”

As users take advantage of the multifaceted website at their disposal, more opportunities are made available to volunteers. The cooperation between faculty, students, and community partners increases significantly with the many service opportunities of the coming holiday season. With hopes of fostering greater bonds of communication and support, growth in Atchison solidarity can be anticipated through GivePulse as this online tool makes the task more possible than ever before.

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