Oxfordshire Advocacy

Are you passionate about getting voices heard?

Most of the advocacy work of OA is carried out by volunteers. These volunteers come from all walks of life, all age groups and all sorts of backgrounds. What they have in common is a little bit of time and an urge to do something useful!

 Volunteers get an opportunity to:

• Work with and meet lots of different people – this helps to improve their communication skills and increase confidence in dealing with people.

• Receive ongoing training in a variety of subjects. Discover and develop skills which will help with future employment. As a volunteer you will be trained by OA and checked by the Criminal Records Bureau before you start any advocacy work.

• Once you are an advocate you will be supported and supervised by a Coordinator. This means that you should always have someone to discuss situations with and to give you advice, or just to off load the details of a difficult meeting!

Obviously not everyone is suited to being an advocate and we hope that the initial training will give you the opportunity to find out if it something you want to do and are able to do. There are some qualities that we look for when recruiting advocates.

 We run 3 or 4 training courses each year. Each training course consists of 3 days initial training and a fourth day when you have had some experience of working as an advocate. You must be able to attend all 3 days of the initial training consecutively. Before being invited on the training you will need to have an informal interview with one of our coordinators so that you can find out more about us and we can find out more about you. If you want more information, to discuss the process or what happens in the training, or want to learn more, see the Contacts page.

 The training courses are held at: Barton Neighbourhood Centre, Underhill Circus, Headington, Oxford OX3 9LS.