The 89 year history of The Cedars as a non-profit is steeped in the tradition of volunteering. In 1927 The Cedars Auxiliary was formed and these dynamic women collected a nickel a week to build The Jewish Home of Aged on Portland’s Munjoy Hill. Today, volunteering at The Cedars is as important – and robust – as ever. The Cedars has over 70 volunteers who give their time to the residents who live here – and last year graciously contributed over 3200 hours! What do these generous men, women and young adults do at The Cedars? Volunteer positions include friendly visitors, activity assistants, pet therapy visitors, helping to facilitate religious services, hospice support, musical entertainers, bridge and cribbage game players, dining assistants, companions, technology tutors and support, book club leaders and more. In addition, our volunteers receive quarterly trainings and gather monthly for group meetings with our Volunteer Coordinator, Janine...
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Each year at The Cedars Retirement Community, we have the difficult task of choosing one person to represent The Cedars as the volunteer of the year. It presents a challenge, because everyone here has remarkable talents and gifts that they share with our residents. This year we recognized Mary Goff a volunteer whom is originally from Green Bay Wisconsin and has followed us throughout history, volunteering for many years at the Jewish home and now present day here at The Cedars. Currently she visits daily with multiple residents, assists the Life Enrichment department with activities and transport, assists residents from the Osher Inn on Regional Transportation Program (RTP) trips and even accompanies residents to their medical appointments. Her overall volunteer experience spans 30 years and includes, Big Brother Big Sister, Habitat for Humanity, Ingraham Volunteers and she has even helped to establish the Portland Chapter of Pine Tree Epilepsy. She is compassionate, enthusiastic...
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The Cedars is dedicated to incorporating wellness throughout our community – for our members, residents and staff. The opportunities to embrace wellness could not have been greater than at our annual Wellness Fair at The Cedars. Vendors from over 20 stations and organizations were there to share their knowledge and services with our community – and everyone indulged in healthy snacks, yoga classes, massage therapy and paraffin dips. Giveaways included a Kindle Fire, and various gift baskets to Dick Sporting Goods, The Cedars Spa and Healthy Eating and Cooking. The Cedars thanks the participating vendors who partnered to make this a great event: Acadia Insurance Harvard Pilgrim – information and cholesterol screening Guardian Dental American Heart Association Cancer Community Center 2-1-1 Maine US Foods Community Counseling Center Hannaford Scarborough Family Chiropractic Walgreen’s Blood Pressure Screening Hula Hooping Portland Maine...
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Happy birthday to us! Twenty-one years today – on August 11, 1991 to be exact –we moved into our beautiful new campus on Portland’s Ocean Avenue. Kathryn Callnan, now president and CEO of The Cedars, was then the director of nursing and orchestrated the move. “We had 62 volunteers, just on the nursing side that day,” remembers Kathy. “One volunteer for each resident.” The volunteers stayed with them all day from the time they left the Jewish Home for Aged on Munjoy Hill until they settled into the new facility, which was then called Cedars Nursing Care Center. Other volunteers, including a group from the Cedars Auxiliary, helped welcome the residents to their new home, served meals, and made the whole operation go smoothly. Staffer Nancy Bloch and volunteer David Cohen assisting a resident with the move. ...
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The Cedars has been enjoying the internet more than ever this summer, thanks to the help of volunteer Michael Michaelson. An upcoming freshman in high school at Wayneflete in Portland, Michael has been visiting members in our retirement community every Thursday morning since June. During his time here, he busily runs from one apartment to the next assisting members and leaving them quite pleased. For instance, he connected one member to skype so she could talk with her daughters who both live in Italy. Another member proudly announced that, because of Michael’s tutelage, she not only knew when her mouse needed new batteries, but she was able to change them herself. Other members are accessing e-mail and FaceBook for the first time – and love it! Michael explains that his work with seniors is quite rewarding. When he saw the “huge” need for seniors to connect on the internet,...
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Ken Murray, Director of Volunteer Services at the Southern Maine Agency on Aging, gave the keynote address at the 2012 Volunteer Recognition Dinner at The Cedars. About 50 volunteers attended, including a group from The Atrium, The Cedars’ independent living facility. According to Murray, success after retirement depends on staying healthy, which includes healthy eating habits, exercise, lifelong learning, a social network, and a sense of purpose. Volunteering, he noted, can help provide that sense of purpose for seniors. “Serving others helps them, it helps us, and it helps our community – and it is a very American value,” he said. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, around 26% of U.S. citizens do volunteer work each year, at an average of 51 hours per year. (Those 65 and older often provide as much as 96 hours per year!) This adds up to a whopping 8.1 billion hours of...
Posted in our blog on by Katharine& filed under Featured.
True Stories by Debby Paley, Volunteer at The Atrium Independent Retirement living at The Cedars In our True Stories group, we take turns telling stories from our lives. It turns out that story-telling as a social activity is making a comeback. There’s even a story-telling hour on Public Radio called “The Moth,” where people stand up at a microphone and tell their true stories. Two things got me interested in this. The first was the story-telling event thathappens three times a year at my daughter’s high school. Everyone (teenagers,parents, friends, teachers, the principal) is invited to stand up and tell astory. My other inspiration was my mother, Cabot Paley. She loved to listen tostories and to tell stories herself. She could weave an interesting story out of just about any everyday occurrence. We all have stories to tell, and in the True Stories group, we simply sit andshare them....
