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Volunteering

In an effort to build a strong school community and to keep education costs as low as possible, all parents of students attending St. Francis de Sales School must volunteer each year. All volunteers must also meet the Diocesan Safe Environment requirements before volunteering. Get details below.

All families will be required to give 25 volunteer hours to the school. Families receiving financial support via a parish grant are required to give an additional 25 hours to the parish to fulfill obligations. 

The volunteer year will begin on May 1 and end on April 30 of the following year.

Examples of activities that can be done for hours – Download here

Any family member or friend may complete these hours, but non-family members must designate in advance that they are completing these hours for a particular family. This is done by the donor family specifying the information during the online signup process (see instructions for more details).

If a family does not complete the required hours, they will be billed at $20 per hour. They will only be billed for unfulfilled hours and not the original total. There are no exemptions for faculty or parish staff.

Families may elect to make a payment in advance at the beginning of the school year to be exempt from these hours. The value of each hour is calculated at $20 so a family required to complete 25 hours would pay $500. This payment cannot be counted towards the charitable deductions you make to the parish as it is a required fee and not a charitable contribution. In addition, if you opt out of the volunteer hours program you may not be refunded for hours completed. Monetary donations towards fundraising activities will not be awarded volunteer hours.

Opportunities for the 2023-24 school year can be found and signed up for here:

Sign-Up to Volunteer at School

Sign-Up to Volunteer for Events

Sign-Up to Volunteer to be a Room Parent

Remember, if you sign up for an opportunity and are unable to fulfill your obligation, you are responsible for finding a substitute. We can't do this without your help and commitment. Training will be provided (dates coming soon).  

We use a cloud-based website to help us facilitate and track volunteer hours called Track It Forward. We would like each family to only use one account for entering volunteer hours. This means that if you currently have multiple accounts associated with your child/ren (i.e. grandma has an account etc.) then they would discontinue using that account and you would either enter their hours with your login or provide them with your login and password so that they may do so.  

Follow these easy steps to get started:

  1. Go to https://www.trackitforward.com/site/st-francis-school
  2. A new page will come up asking you to Sign In.  If you’ve never used the site before, you will have to create a new account.  Select “Sign Up” under the orange “Sign In” button
  3. Enter your email address, password, first name, last name, phone number, the youngest or only child attending St. Francis. CRITICAL! THIS IS HOW HOURS ARE APPLIED**
  4. Lastly, the logging type (select ‘student no parish grant’ if you don’t receive a subsidy, and ‘student parish grant’ if you do) then select “Sign Up”

When you log in you will then see your home page, which is an Hour Logging page.

Entering Hours

  1.  Enter your hours accumulated for that shift (Example: 1.5 hours)
  2. Select the date for the shift; NOTE: You can add in shifts retroactively
  3. Select your Activity; NOTE: If you did multiple activities during your shift, either select the activity you did MOST or create separate entries for each activity
  4. If your activity isn’t listed, select “Other” and enter a description in the “Notes” section
  5. Select “Submit Time”

 Examples of activities that can be done for hours – Download here

Other Uses for the Site

  • On the log hours screen, to the right under “Timesheet” you can view a graphical representation of your total number of hours accumulated (year-to-date)
  • Select “Charts” from the upper tab to see a visual representation of your hours
  • Select “Account” from the upper tab to see your profile, update your information etc.

Mobile App

  • There is a free mobile app available that can be used only to log your hours; NOTE: You must create an account the website first and all other functions (profile updates, exporting data, viewing charts and milestones) must be done on a computer

Forgot Password

Visit here to reset your Track It Forward password.

If you have any questions, please contact Dave Stenson.

Access the Online Volunteer Hours tool Track it Forward 

Download the above setup guide here.

The Diocese of Columbus has created a Safe Environment Program designed to protect children while they are in the care, custody or control of any person working or volunteering on behalf of the Church. Protecting God’s Children™ training is just one step of the overall Safe Environment Program. The Diocese also requires completion of a criminal background check (fingerprinting).

Protecting God’s Children

To complete Protecting God’s Children requirements, the Diocese of Columbus participates in Virtus, a program and service of the National Catholic Risk Retention Group, Inc.  Visit their site at www.virtus.org to view a list of upcoming sessions in our area.  These sessions are free and last about two hours.

Criminal Background Check

If you have been a resident of the State of Ohio for less than five years, you are required to have both a BCI and an FBI background check. Residents of more than five years are only required to only have a BCI background check. 

The Newark Police Department will process your fingerprints for a nominal fee.  Please contact them at 740-670-7205 for further information. Search for other background check location options here.

When you request your background check be sure to note the following:

  • Ask that they send the results electronically to Diocese of Columbus, Attention:  Regina Quinn, 197 East Gay Street, Columbus, Ohio  43215; Results sent directly to the school or parish will be invalid and you will need to retake the fingerprints
  • Provide them with Code #2151.86 for volunteering

Although not required to do so by diocesan policy, we strongly encourage all parish volunteers to complete civilian criminal background checks and attend Protecting God’s Children training sessions, even if you will not directly have care, custody, or control of children and youth, as the safety of young people is best assured when all adults have been trained and understand how to build a safe environment.

St. Francis Safe Environment Program Acknowledgements

Further information and forms, as well as related policies, can be found on the Diocesan website. 

Please contact St. Francis Safe Environment Coordinator, Kathryn Sardini with any questions.