York Castle Museum

Volunteering

Welcome to our Volunteer Programme

York Museums Trust has an active Volunteer Programme across all of its sites and we welcome volunteers from all walks of life. Our volunteers are invaluable in helping us to achieve one of our core objectives of promoting access to the collections, gardens and buildings appropriate to the 21^st Century.

We have a diverse range of volunteer projects; many are "behind the scenes" such as research projects, cataloguing or preparation of holiday activities, but we also have a number of opportunities for volunteers to be in the "front seat", interacting with visitors to enthuse and inspire them with objects from the collections that we care for.

Projects for which we are currently recruiting

York Art Gallery

We run holiday and weekend activities at York Art Gallery which usually involve assisting a visiting artist or our Assistant Curator of Arts Learning, to prepare and deliver informal learning sessions to family or specialist groups. This involves helping to set up the Studio and being on hand to encourage and support participants to achieve their goals in the activity.

We recruit at various times throughout the year to meet the demands of holiday activity. To register your interest, please see the instructions below for joining the volunteer database.

Studio Saturdays

First Saturday of every month, 10.30am - 1.15pm and 2pm - 4pm

A volunteer is needed to help out in The Studio with artist-led drop-in art workshops aimed at the general public and is particularly popular with families. Each session links with a particular exhibition in The Gallery. The volunteer will assist by getting The Studio space and materials ready, maintaining the availability of materials throughout the day and keeping the workspace reasonably tidy as well as talking to the public about the session

Weekend and Holiday Activities

We run holiday and weekend activities at York Art Gallery which usually involve assisting a visiting artist or our Assistant Curator of Arts Learning, to prepare and deliver informal learning sessions to family or specialist groups. This involves helping to set up the Studio and being on hand to encourage and support participants to achieve their goals in the activity.

We recruit at various times throughout the year to meet the demands of holiday activity. To register your interest, please see the instructions below for joining the volunteer database.

How to apply for current projects

If you would like to get involved with any of our current projects, please click here to download and complete a copy of our Volunteer Application Form and return it to fiona.burton@ymt.org.uk or send it by post to Fiona Burton, Volunteers Manager, York Museums Trust, York Castle Museum, The Eye of York, YORK, YO1 9RY

Future Projects

We have plans for a number of volunteer projects in the future and we frequently have small ad hoc projects coming up. If none of our current projects are for you but you would still like to explore the possibility of volunteering with us, why not join our volunteer database?

Volunteer Database

We maintain a database of potential volunteers who are sent information by e-mail about all our volunteer projects as we launch them. The information covers all our sites but you can ignore anything that doesn’t interest you. We do not use your contact details for any other purpose within York Museums Trust and we never disclose them to third parties.

How to apply to join our database

If you would like to be included on the database, please complete the online form at the bottom of this page marking the "Area of Interest" as Database. If you are only interested in volunteering at one of our sites, eg York Art Gallery, please also specify this in the "Area of Interest" box.

Meet the volunteer...

Our volunteers take part in a wide variety of projects - here is just one example.

Name David Bagnall

Age 37

Role Volunteer at art workshops held at York Art Gallery.

What has the work involved? I've been helping at school holiday art workshops, working for 2½ hour sessions. I help children choose the pictures they want to draw and the materials they want to use and give them ideas and encouragement.

How did you get involved? I’m a part-time history tutor and I would really like to get into educational museum work so I contacted the trust and said I wanted to get involved. I was put in touch with Gaby Lees, assistant curator of arts learning at the gallery, who told me about these workshops.

Would you recommend it to others? Yes - I've loved it so far. Just seeing the enthusiasm of the children coming in is really exciting. The hours fit in fine with the rest of my life.

Our verdict Gaby says: "It's great to have a volunteer in to help with our drop-in workshop sessions here at the gallery as it's important to give each child some individual attention. At busy times this just wouldn't be possible without some assistance. David is really good at praising the children's achievements and encouraging them to try new materials."