Volunteers help in many ways, from staffing our hospital shops, supporting us at our events, distributing and gathering collection cans and helping in the office.
As an ECHC volunteer, you will receive an induction and all necessary training. You will have a named contact and be welcomed to volunteer events to meet the wider team and other volunteers. We will also regularly keep you up to date with any new opportunities and how your support is making a difference.
Unfortunately, we cannot accept volunteers under the age of 16 unless they are accompanied by a responsible adult.
Please scroll down to find out about the current volunteering roles we have available.
At ECHC, we want everyone to have opportunity to take part. Having a diverse range of perspectives within our volunteer group improves our work and upholds our values. We encourage people that represent the diverse communities that we serve to apply to volunteer with us. We actively recruit volunteers with experience of disability, neurodivergence, ethnic minoritisation and from LGBTQ+ communities.
We think carefully when creating our roles to cater to a broad range of access needs. We encourage you to discuss your access needs when invited to interview and we will then adapt our process as best we can. We can also explore together the role that might best suit you. Whilst we can’t guarantee a position that suits all access needs, we actively work towards broadening accessibility with our volunteers and staff. All disabled applicants who meet our role criteria will be interviewed.
We have some exciting new volunteer roles, supporting our youth work team within the hospital. We are looking for calm, friendly and fun individuals to support the team in the following roles:
Youth Work Volunteer: support our ECHC Youth Project Worker in visiting wards to deliver activities to children and young people at RHCYP. Some experience in youth project work and clinical environments would be preferable. We are looking for support Wednesdays and Thursdays, 1pm – 4pm (weekly)
Full role profile
Zoo Support Volunteer: support our ECHC Youth Project Worker/Edinburgh Zoo practitioner in visiting RHCYP wards to deliver educational and fun activities to children and young people. This role is on Thursdays, 9:30am until 12:00 noon (weekly)
Full role profile
Film Night Volunteer – assisting our Youth Work Team with our twice per month film nights in the RHCYP. This role is two Fridays per month, 5pm – 8pm.
Full role profile
For more information including required experience for these roles, please check out the role profiles. We are looking for a minimum six month commitment. Full training will be given for all roles. If you are interested, please complete the application form below and tell us why the role would suit you!
We have some exciting new volunteer roles, supporting our arts team within the hospital.
We are looking for fun, friendly, and approachable individuals to support the team in the following roles.
Arts Volunteer – ‘Space Academy’: Support our ECHC Arts Officer to deliver the ‘Space Academy’ programme to children and young people at RHCYP. Some experience/knowledge in supporting the facilitation of art activities and experience of working within a clinical environment would be preferred.
We are looking for support at the following days and times on a weekly basis:
A minimum of 1 slot per week will be required. Initially, this volunteering role will be for 6 weeks.
Full role profile
Arts Volunteer – ‘Diabetes Project’ : To support the delivery of a project for children and families in managing diabetes through innovative and engaging artistic activities at RHCYP. This role would be ideal for someone who is interested in developing their career in working within art and/or health. We are looking for support on these specific days and times:
Ideally, we would prefer to have the same person to support each session.
Full role profile
We are looking for friendly and enthusiastic volunteers to help in the ECHC Hospital shop. Our shop serves the staff, children, families and visitors in the RHCYP with drinks, snacks, sandwiches, gifts and more. No experience is necessary as full training will be given. Please see role profile for more details. We are currently looking for support at the following times:
If interested please complete an application form.
We’re seeking volunteers to support our drop in service, The Hub, based within the RHCYP. In this varied role we’re looking for people who can enthusiastically participate in activities with children and young people, and provide and empathetic listening ear to families when needed. If this sounds like you, please do get in touch.
Full details can be found in the role profile and the available, weekly slots are:
Our fundraising team is vital to the work of ECHC, raising the funds to help seriously ill babies, children and young people in hospital. We are keen to build and develop our team of volunteers who support our fundraising activities, creating a bank of trained volunteers to assist with a variety of tasks throughout the year.
Volunteers support us at events, from bag packs and bucket collections to helping at black tie dinners. If you would like to know about these ad hoc opportunities please get in touch: volunteering@echcharity.org
We also have regular fundraising volunteers supporting us in the office and more. Please see individual role profiles below for more information or get in touch if you want to chat through the requirements of the role:
Please note: the volunteering opportunities we offer are to support the work undertaken and services provided by our charity. Many of our opportunities are NOT based within the Royal Hospital for Children and Young People.
If you are looking to volunteer within the hospital (e.g. ward volunteers), please visit the NHS Lothian volunteering page for more information.