Volunteer for the New York Marine Rescue Center

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Learn. Contribute. Grow.

Volunteers play a vital role in the operation of the New York Marine Rescue Center. We simply could not do without them!

As a volunteer, there are plenty of support teams to choose from. Take part in fundraising projects, greet aquarium visitors at our Rescue Center, and spread awareness at fairs. Train to join our rescue team and support our talented biologists with rescuing and rehabilitating marine life. Whichever you choose, you will be making a significant difference. Join our team today!

Junior Volunteers

In addition to our volunteer program (for all individuals 18 and over), we have a junior volunteer program for anyone between 12 and 15 years of age. Junior volunteers must attend a volunteer orientation with their parent or guardian, who must also register and become a volunteer. Their parent or guardian must be present for every volunteer shift with the junior volunteer until the junior volunteer is at least 16 years of age. Those who are 16 and 17 years old will need their parent or guardian to sign a liability form prior to the first volunteer shift but will not need to have a chaperone present while volunteering. Junior volunteers can assist in the Rescue Center as an educator, attend fairs and festivals, help with beach cleanups, assist with animal releases and many more opportunities! The only exception is that anyone under 18 years old cannot have any hands-on animal care positions. Additionally, anyone under 16 cannot be an education docent.

There are a variety of opportunities for our volunteers including, but not limited to:

Rescue Center Educator

The New York Marine Rescue Center (NYMRC) is a separate organization from the Long Island Aquarium (LIA). It is of the utmost importance that we educate visitors about our organization as they walk through our rescue center. It will be your job as a Rescue Center Educator to educate patrons about seals and sea turtles in NY waters, the rescue efforts of NYMRC, and how they can get involved. Often, several rescued sea turtles can be seen from the rescue center and you will get the chance to talk to visitors about specific patients receiving care in our hospital facility.

Education Docent

Volunteers interact with visitors on the LIA's floor by representing the NYMRC as an education docent. Education docents educate guests on what we do and how important our marine environment is by giving additional information about specific habitats and exhibits found in the LIA. Current habitats available for docents to cover include the Rescue Center, Ray Bay, Coral Habitat, Shark Habitat, and Touch Tank. From the experience you gain as an interpreter, you can enhance your training by learning scheduled lectures or learn how to give behind the scenes tours. We are always in need of enthusiastic educators to teach guests about conservation issues.

Education Programs

Education is a very important part of what we do here at the NYMRC. We have a variety of education programs from lectures, mock strandings, beach cleanups, and behind the scenes tours. We are always looking to train volunteers to assist with these programs so that we can reach a larger audience and share our mission of conservation with as many groups and schools as we can. We offer training opportunities beginning with shadowing and observing programs. When volunteers are comfortable, practice sessions can be scheduled with staff.

Beach Patrols/Clean ups

Become a Beach Patroller and search Long Island Beaches in the fall/winter months looking for cold-stunned sea turtles. Patrols are conducted October-January (seasonal opportunity, not included in the regular volunteer program). It is not necessary to attend a volunteer orientation if you are only interested in the beach patrol program. Instead, you would need to attend a training session held from July-November.

For the beach cleanups, you also do not need to become a volunteer to join us on the beach. You just need to register for which location and date you would like to join us. You can find this information on our website. Click on our calendar and any date with a dot represents a date with an event. If you hover over the dot, you will receive additional information about the event and how to sign up. You are also welcome to call or email us for additional assistance with registering for an event. We do look for individuals to join the volunteer program to become leaders at beach cleanups or data collector leads so that we can expand our program and adopt more beaches.

Fairs and Festivals

Spend time at conservation or environmentally focused events as you work a booth for the NYMRC. Volunteers at the booth answer questions and inform the public about who we are and what to do when they see a marine mammal or sea turtle in New York waters. These are great opportunities for us to educate individuals that are less familiar with NYMRC's programs.

Office Volunteer

The NYMRC needs your help with our day to day office operations from answering the phone and inventorying items to putting together packages for the mail.

Fundraising/Program support

Currently, we host three fundraising events per year and we are always looking for volunteer support for these events. Tasks could include helping solicit items for our raffle/auction, informing the local residents and businesses about any street closures, onsite support such as assisting with setup, breakdown, check in, selling raffle tickets and so much more.

Seal and Sea Turtle Releases

We need plenty of help when we return rehabilitated seals and sea turtles back into their natural habitat. These releases are public events where we need help from crowd control, merchandise table, photo/video taking, and more. Volunteers of all ages are able to attend and participate in this volunteer experience after completing additional training.

Rescue Team

For those who are interested in hands on experience with marine mammals and sea turtles; and have met all of the requirements, including additional training, you can join our staff biologists with the care of our injured marine life. As you can imagine, this can be an exciting position, and everyone over the age of 18 is eligible to assist the rehabilitation process after completion of an additional training session- scheduled based upon season and ability. However, it is important for all volunteers to become involved in at least one other part of the organization for two reasons. First, the NYMRC cannot function and attempt rehabilitation efforts without adequate assistance in all other aspects of the organization. Second, during periods when animals are not at the facility, being active in other parts of the organization will give a sense of belonging and keep you up to date on new programs. After a minimum of 50 hours of volunteer service, ICS courses, and two recommendation letters, volunteers who have expressed an interest can attend a Rescue Team orientation. If accepted to the Rescue Team a weekly commitment will be required.

There are many other opportunities too!

If you decided that volunteering is for you, please visit our website at newyorkmarinerescue.org and select Help Us! from the drop-down menu, then volunteer. Then, a new screen will appear and you will need to select apply to volunteer. After you apply and create a Better Impact account, please register for an orientation thru Better Impact. We host a virtual volunteer orientation on the last Thursday of each month from 7:00 - 8:00 pm. This orientation is conducted on Zoom and lasts approximately 1 hour. After completing the orientation, you will receive an email with a link to watch a video and the final step is to take an online assessment, the email you receive will provide instructions on where to find the assessment. Following the successful completion of your assessment, opportunities to volunteer will open up to you. Please note that a change must be manually made to your profile by staff before opportunities are available to you. Once the update has been made, you will receive an email with information on how to find signup for volunteer shifts. We do ask for a $50 dollar donation to help pay for your volunteer tee shirt and training materials. During your first shift, we will collect your donation, you will receive your tee shirt, and fill out a liability waiver and expectations form.

There are some perks to becoming a volunteer in addition to the ability to participate in challenging and rewarding life experiences which offer personal enrichment. By donating a minimum of 8 hours of service per month you can receive the following benefits:

• Two free guest passes to the Long Island Aquarium for every 6 months of continuous volunteer service after initial 50 hours

• 30% discount in the cafe, gift shop, and "Scoops" ice cream shop upon completion of training

• One free meal on day of volunteer activity with a minimum of 4 hours of volunteer service

• A membership to the Long Island Aquarium after 50 hours of service, renewable on anniversary date

• Annual recognition event/awards ceremony
• Unlimited learning opportunities offering the ability to acquire new skills and knowledge