Hello NOLA Ready Volunteer Corps volunteers and MRC volunteers,

We are excited to be involved with running COVID-19 vaccine sites in New Orleans. Thank you to all who have volunteered with us at a vaccine site these past few weeks! Due to the increase in vaccine allocation to Orleans Parish, we have a new volunteer vaccination policy in place, effective Monday, March 8th, 2021.

Working regularly at vaccine sites, volunteers are part of the community healthcare system and thus are eligible to receive the vaccine in Louisiana. After volunteering for at least 10 hours at a City-run POD or at the LCMC mass vaccination site, volunteers will be eligible to receive the COVID vaccine should appointments be available. Keep reading for all the details:

Here’s how this will work:

1. First, volunteer! Our scheduling system, Better Impact, will automatically track your hours for you.
2. After you have volunteered for at least 10 hours at a vaccine site, the Better Impact system will notify our volunteer coordination team. Your name will be added to the “Volunteers Eligible to Receive Vaccine List”.
3. The NOLA Ready Volunteer Corps administrators will share the list of eligible volunteers with vaccine providers on a regular basis.
4. Once eligible, you may receive a call from a provider to schedule an appointment and get your shot.

FAQs: Vaccine Appointment Scheduling

• You do not need to call a provider to schedule an appointment, they will call you.
• Please do not schedule a vaccine appointment during your volunteer shift. Work with the vaccine provider to schedule an appointment outside of your volunteer shift.
• The day after you get the vaccine, you may experience some side effects. Plan to rest the day after you get the vaccine – so don’t plan to volunteer the day after you get the shot. A good rule of thumb is to begin volunteering again two to three days after you receive your vaccine.

FAQs: Hours Tracking

• You must volunteer for at least 10 hours to receive the vaccine. We cannot accommodate “rounding up.”
• Time spent volunteering at a City-run vaccine site, at the OPCD call center scheduling COVID appointments, or at the LCMC mass vaccination site, will count towards your 10 hours.
• This policy is in effect retroactively, so if you have already volunteered at vaccine sites for 10 or more hours, you will be placed on the Volunteers Eligible to Receive Vaccine List.
• Time spent taking online trainings does not count towards the 10 hours.
• Because of limited supply, we cannot guarantee you a vaccine.

Tips to Help Facilitate this Process

• Log in and ensure your correct contact information is in the system. This is the information that will be sent to vaccine providers. How to here.
• Opt in to receive text alerts through Better Impact, in case you need to be contacted ASAP. How to here.
• Please add a clear, unobstructed photo of your face into your volunteer profile to help with the process. How to here.
• If you have already received a COVID vaccine, please indicate that in your profile, as it will help us narrow down the Volunteers Eligible to Receive Vaccine List.
  • Click this link to log in and navigate to the bottom of the page. Fill out the section called “COVID-19 Vaccination Information”.

- The Team at NOLA Ready
-The Team at MRC

volunteer@nola.gov

Quick refresher: How to sign up for shifts

If you've already trained up, check our Opportunities Page to see volunteer shifts and sign up for them. We recommend bookmarking the page and checking back periodically as our volunteer team adds more shifts in.

Opportunities page: 

https://app.betterimpact.com/Volunteer/Schedule/Opportunities  

We’ve found that the default settings are better on the Opportunities page (the link listed above) rather than on the Opportunities calendar, or on the app. So if you’re having difficulty seeing shifts, try using the link above.

Shift visibility

Shifts are visible to volunteers who have completed all three trainings in the POD Training Curriculum.

• If you have completed VAC 100, HIP 100, and have uploaded the FEMA ICS certificate into your profile, and you are still not able to see shifts, please email volunteer@nola.gov and we can help problem solve.

NOLA Ready is the City of New Orleans' emergency preparedness campaign, managed by the New Orleans Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness. 

This message contains emergency preparedness information. Emergency alerts are sent through a separate program. To sign up for emergency alerts, text your zip code to 888777 or go to ready.nola.gov/alerts.