As seasons begin to transition, in many parts of the world temperatures are dropping and winter is rapidly approaching. This is always an extremely difficult time of year for marginalized and vulnerable individuals, many of whom live in remote areas with little to no access to resources.

In the United States, 1 in 7 Americans are currently living below the poverty threshold and oftentimes find themselves having to choose between food for their families and paying rent.

All of these issues, with the added stress of the pandemic, mean that many families don’t have the necessary resources to stay warm this winter season.

UMR has doubled down on its commitment to ensure that no one has to endure the cold temperatures without a jacket to keep them warm.

As a One Warm Coat nonprofit partner, we will be hosting winter kit packaging events where individuals can drop off the winter items they collected and help us sort and package the donations for their final recipients. We will be providing our winter kits to refugee and homeless individuals by working with local resettlement organizations and shelters.

Volunteers will be asked to:

Bring winter items collected during our coat drives campaign or bring some smaller winter items to donate on event day.
Help take inventory of donated winter items to ensure they are in excellent condition.
Helping us to clean and disinfect all donated items that are gently used to ensure they are fully sterilized before delivering
Assist with sorting of donations by item, age group (adult/children), and gender (men/women/unisex)
Packaging the items together in boxes for bulk donation or in individually packaged winter kits depending on preferences of local partners
We may ask for volunteers to assist us with drop off/distribution of winter kits depending on the city of the event. This information will be announced at each event.

Dates, Times, & Locations:

Sunday, November 21st, 11 AM - 2 PM, NIA Masjid - Newark, NJ
Sunday, November 28th, 11 AM - 2 PM, UMR Office - Washington, DC
Saturday, December 4th, 11 AM - 2 PM, Islamic Center of Wheaton - Chicago, IL
Saturday, December 11th, 11 AM - 3 PM, MAS Islamic Center of Dallas - Richardson, TX
Volunteers Requesting: For each of our event cities, we are looking for 10-20 volunteers because we will be inviting our chapters and local schools who have held drives to help package and sort (so sign up while you can as cities will be removed from sign up when capacity is reached!).

Sign Up: To sign up for one of our events in a city near you, please submit the sign-up form on our website. The only thing we ask if you will be attending our winter kit packaging events is that you bring some winter items to donate along with smiles and enthusiasm!

Due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, we will ask that all volunteers attending, regardless of vaccination status, wear a mask during the event unless eating or drinking. This applies to all of our locations.

If you have any questions, feel free to reach out to our Volunteer Management Coordinator.