Coronavirus impacts everyone, including non profits like us
It is now officially a global pandemic and it has an impact on everyone, everything, and every sector of life and business.
The impact of this global pandemic is in front of us all. As the spread of the COVID 19 / coronavirus continues with over 118,000 confirmed cases in 114 countries, everyone is affected: from our own personal safety and that of our family and friends, our daily life and our daily routines, our local communities, our schools, our businesses, our plans for the months to come.
Even the way people volunteer and donate their time to causes they believe in have been affected, in particular when volunterism is in the form of community work, and operating side-by-side with volunteers and communities, on the ground, often internationally.
This is our case at Adventures in Preservation (AiP), a US-based 501(c)3 non-profit organization dedicated to connect people and historic preservation through enriching experiential and travel programs that safeguard heritage and foster community sustainability.
Our volunteers — we call them Jammers — travel around the world to help us preserve historic building in places like Armenia, Scotland (UK), and the Galapagos (Ecuador), but also here at home with programs in Montana and Virginia.
Earlier this month, AiP announced that, due to the spread of the coronavirus, we were placing May and June projects on temporary hold as the time frame of the spread unfolds.
This is a health and safety precaution to protect the many volunteers who have already signed up. We decided that, if we do need to cancel projects, the fee for those who have already registered may be applied to a future date. If no future date works out, a refund will be given.
Obviously, this directly affects our operational ability and our planning for future projects. But thousands of non profits, foundations, and other organizations like us have been impacted.
It is important to share our stories, and talk about the impact of our work. Like many other non profits, we are small, but we like to believe the impact we have on communities is big.
The situation is dire also for many cultural and historic sites around the world, many of which survives thanks to tickets that tourists and visitors pay.
Here in the US, as The New York Times reports, “theaters, museums, and concert halls are hyperaware that their establishments could become petri dishes for a virus that is spread person-to-person through respiratory droplets.”
The Times continues: “These institutions are nervously looking at what has happened overseas, in places like China and Italy, where museums have been closed, concerts canceled and movie theaters shuttered.”
Jan Newcomb, the executive director of the National Coalition for Arts’ Preparedness and Emergency Response, told the Times that “The loss of performances [and ticket sales] can be devastating,” and “Organizations sometimes don’t recover.”
Artnet News reports that “From Rome to Jerusalem, cultural sites are unsettlingly devoid of people” in an article filled with photos from sites in Italy and in other countries around the world empty of visitors.
The paper explains: “Around the world, countries are experiencing striking declines in tourism as people have been instructed to avoid large groups and limit travel. Recent photographs give a sense of the apocalyptic feel in these hallowed sites, which are usually buzzing with activity.”
About Adventures in Preservation (AiP)
Adventures in Preservation (AiP) is a non-profit connecting people and preservation through enriching cultural heritage travel and hands-on education. AiP was founded in 2001 by two women with a great love of historic buildings and a strong desire to travel and understand the world. While perusing the travel section of the Boulder Bookstore, the Volunteer Vacation section suddenly brought everything into focus. Judith Broeker and Jamie Donahoe combined their goal of saving historic buildings with the concept of experiential travel, and created AiP’s hands-on preservation vacations.
Work started on several sites in the U.S., and as word spread, requests for help began to pour in from around the world, underscoring the great potential of using volunteers to restore historic buildings. In supporting community-based preservation initiatives, we discovered that our love of old buildings could translate into environmental and economic sustainability for communities.
AiP is picking up the pace! As our hands-on experiential travel becomes more popular, we have new projects, new partners and initiatives to keep you excited and involved.
