Volunteer with your favorite local or professional team, and join the action on or off the field.
Ah, autumn…crisp air is on its way, and with it, fond memories of playing fall sports. Plus, we’re entering many people’s best-loved time of year: football season. If you’ve been yearning to get back in the game, consider volunteering. Odds are that your favorite sport can use support–at all levels, from kids’ community teams to professional leagues.
Ask Your Alma Mater What They Need
A great place to start looking for a sports-related volunteer opportunity is your alma mater: high school, college, or university. Reach out to the athletics office and identify yourself as an alumnus looking to give back to the community. The services these teams need might not be glamorous, like setting up snacks or cleaning equipment, so it’s good to be willing to start small. Other schools might need help with fundraising events or, of course, coaching (more on that below). The big sports schools may have special volunteer opportunities, too. The Penn State All-Sports Museum, for example, looks for volunteers to act as docents and greet visitors to the museum.
Join the Volunteer Team for Tournaments Hosted in Your City
These opportunities don’t come around everyday, but that makes them all the more exciting. National and international tournaments taking place in your city will need help to carry off a successful event, and volunteers make the magic happen.
- FIFA World Cup 2026 is coming to various cities in the U.S., Canada, and Mexico next year, and NOW is the time to apply to join the volunteer team. The application closes in August. “FIFA World Cup 26™ volunteers will be part of a once-in-a-generation team,” FIFA says, “helping bring to life a tournament uniting three countries, 16 Host Cities and billions of hearts around the world.” For soccer fans, this is not a chance to be missed.
- The Special Olympics take place all year around the country, and they need volunteers for long- and short-term tasks. Bringing together people with intellectual disabilities in competition through 32 Olympic-type sports, the Special Olympics looks for volunteers to help organize events, serve as coaches, and even join in the game as unified partners, or athletes playing alongside the Special Olympians.
Team Up with the Professional Leagues as a Stadium Tour Guide
If you’re a big-league fan of baseball or football, consider becoming a stadium tour guide. In most cases, tour guide is a part-time job that requires an application process, perhaps a competitive one. But if you get your foot in the door, this position could be an ideal retirement gig: what could be better than getting paid to hang out at the stadium and share your knowledge of the team with fellow fans? Sample job postings from the Los Angeles Dodgers and Green Bay Packers refer to qualifications like “public speaking/theatrical performance experience,” an ability to “share fascinating stories and historical facts about the Dodgers,” and availability on game weekends.
Be the Coach
Coaching youth sports is a calling. For those whose lives were shaped by their experiences playing sports as a kid, giving back through coaching can be supremely rewarding. Sports build skills and character traits like teamwork, perseverance, discipline, and knowing how to have fun. Coaches are the teachers who make it all possible. Coaching basketball, softball, track, swimming, soccer, or any other youth sport will be a major time commitment, so consider starting off as an assistant or substitute coach if you want to try it out first. To find volunteer coaching positions, in addition to reaching out to local schools, try contacting your town’s recreation department. The YMCA also needs volunteer coaches.
Get Out on the Field as an Athlete
The National Senior Games are an Olympic-style multi-sport event held at local, regional, and national levels in the U.S. for adults over 50. As NSG Director of Health and Wellness Andrew Walker described in CSA Journal recently, the Games engage over 100,000 participants in the U.S. each year. Many of these athletes started playing their sport in their 40s, 50s, and 60s. The National Senior Games hold that athletics, including high-quality competition, can be life-changing at any age. One way to get involved is as an athlete, and the Games also need volunteers to support with registration, event set up, scorekeeping, guiding spectators within the venues, and transportation and hospitality needs.
With so many ways to support healthy competition in the community, there’s no reason to stay on the sidelines this fall.
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