What's motivating volunteers across the country, especially this Thanksgiving

Summary

---

Consider This from NPR

Episode: What's motivating volunteers across the country, especially this Thanksgiving

Aired: November 27, 2025
Host: Scott Detrow

---

Overview

On this Thanksgiving-themed episode of "Consider This," NPR's Scott Detrow highlights the motivations, stories, and impact of American volunteers—especially poignant during the holiday season. Drawing from the "Here to Help" series and fresh interviews, the episode dives into personal narratives and community efforts, including key voices from across the country and a deep look at one of the largest food distribution events led by Project Give Back. The episode is a heartfelt exploration of why people give their time and the ripple effects of service.

---

Key Discussion Points & Insights

Stories of Giving Back: Volunteers Share Motivation

• Gerard van der Werken (Habitat for Humanity Austin) [00:32]

  • 76 years old, celebrated his 50th build with Habitat.
  • Feels deeply moved at each home dedication due to his own immigrant story.
  • Quote:

    "I was called a crier. Every dedication I speak and I shed tears... there was a helping hand to get us here. And so I was very appreciative of that extending hand. So I was willing to give back." [00:32]

• Lee Cooper (Maine Needs) [01:27]

  • Packs clothing and personal kits for strangers, some in recovery from addiction.
  • Draws from personal experience—33 years sober.
  • Quote:

    "I did the best packing job I could for her... I wrote her a note that just said, good luck in your sobriety." [01:27]

Broad Tapestry of Volunteer Work

• Listener Submissions [03:06-04:48]

  • Hundreds of responses from across the country highlight the variety of volunteering: librarians, Scout leaders, food pantries, municipal boards, and compost groups.

  • James and Hillary Cornwell:

    • Medieval reenactor volunteers in schools for 35 years.
    • Quote:

      "We bring real metal and leather pieces of armor for kids to try on... volunteering in classrooms and keeping connected with kids. Some of the motivation is selfish. The students keep us sharp." [03:42]

  • Jake Sale (Opera Usher, San Francisco) [04:17]:

    • Nominates fellow volunteer ushers for their "quiet dignity."
    • Quote:

      "It’s not always about grand gestures. It’s small acts of steadiness." [04:27]

  • Sandra Hicks (Manchester, NH) [04:48]:

    • Remembered for nearly 50 years of activism and volunteerism, even as a legally blind person.

Focusing on Food Insecurity and Large-Scale Volunteerism

• Project Give Back at University of the District of Columbia [05:17-11:48]

  • Event brings together hundreds of volunteers—students, Greek organizations—packing food for families.

  • Ransom Miller—Founder and Chair:

    • Reflects on starting as a small office idea—helping six families—to feeding over 5,700 in 2025.

    • Quote:

      "Nobody gets paid. We don't have any paid staff. All of the money that we raise goes into our programming... we've assembled a team of people who have made that a seamless process." [08:55]

    • Notes the amplified need due to government shutdowns and paused SNAP benefits.

      • Quote:

        "There’s a need in this area for food assistance... the SNAP benefits and the federal government shutdown exacerbated that problem. We have never gotten the amount of calls that we got this year." [10:24]

    • The project now reaches into Maryland, Virginia, Oklahoma City, and Indianapolis.

    • Inspiration from the next generation:

      • Quote (recounting a conversation with his son):

        "He said, 'Well, don’t you think we should do more?... I think we should do more.'" [09:28]

  • Volunteer Motivation:

    • Meaty Bardinelli (volunteer for 20+ years) emphasizes the foundational need for food.

    • Jamir Farrer (Naval Academy student) says volunteering is about giving back when you have been fortunate.

    • Quote:

      "It's imperative that Maslow's hierarchy of needs starts off with food, clothing and shelter. And so if we don’t have food to sustain us, then it's a no go." —Meaty Bardinelli [06:27]

---

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Gerard van der Werken:
  "It just moves me to see that there are people in this world that really understands that you can't get through life without a helping hand." [00:32]

• Lee Cooper:
  "I know what it's like in early sobriety... I wrote her a note that just said, good luck in your sobriety." [01:27]

• James Cornwell (on classroom volunteering):
  "Now all of us are old enough to be the seventh graders' grandparents. Well, there's a sense of fulfillment in volunteering in classrooms... The students keep us sharp." [03:42]

• Jake Sale:
  "There's a quiet dignity in what they do... It's not always about grand gestures. It's small acts of steadiness." [04:27]

• Meaty Bardinelli:
  "If we don't have food to sustain us, then it's a no go. It's a non starter, right?" [06:27]

• Ransom Miller:
  "What better to franchise than service and helping other people?" [11:30]

---

Important Timestamps

| Timestamp | Segment | |-----------|---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| | 00:00 | Introduction; Thanksgiving focus and "Here to Help" series highlight | | 00:32 | Gerard van der Werken's story of volunteering with Habitat for Humanity | | 01:27 | Lee Cooper explains personal motivation for volunteering with Maine Needs | | 03:06 | Listener nominations—diverse volunteer stories begin | | 03:42 | James and Hillary Cornwell share their experience as classroom reenactors | | 04:17 | Jake Sale on the steady acts of volunteer ushers | | 04:48 | Sandra Hicks remembered for a lifetime of advocacy | | 05:17 | Shift to large-scale volunteering: Project Give Back's Thanksgiving food distribution | | 05:53 | Ransom Miller coordinates volunteers | | 07:11 | Ransom Miller recounts the origins of Project Give Back | | 08:55 | Scale and logistics of Project Give Back in 2025 | | 10:24 | The impact of federal shutdown and increased food insecurity | | 11:30 | Project Give Back expands—“franchising” service | | 11:48 | Episode wrap-up, key stats (helping >5,700 families in 2025), and closing remarks |

---

Tone and Messaging

Reflective, grateful, and community-centered, the episode blends emotional personal testimony with large-scale organizing, illustrating that service takes many forms and every act—big or small—makes a difference. It celebrates those who give back and underlines the continued need for compassion and collective action, especially during challenging times and the holiday season.

---

Transcript

[Scott Detrow]

Happy Thanksgiving. On this holiday we are doing something a little different. We are taking some time to talk about the volunteer work Americans do. For the past six months we have been featuring stories of service and community in a series called Here to Help Stories of people like 76 year old Gerard van der Werken, a volunteer with Habitat for Humanity Austin. He loves the work he did his 50th build this year. He says his favorite part is when he and other volunteers turn over the keys to the family who who will be living in their new home.

[Gerard van der Werken]

I was called a crier. Every dedication I speak and I shed tears because what most people didn't realize that I was an immigrant too. I came to America many, many years ago. I was born in Jakarta, Indonesia. I'm basically Americanized. But to come to America at that time there was a helping hand to get us here. And so I was very appreciative of that extending hand. So I was willing give back. And so it just moves me to see that there are people in this world that really understands that you can't get through life without a helping hand.

[Scott Detrow]

Earlier this year we also heard from Lee Cooper. Cooper volunteers at Maine Needs, a group that provides clothing for people in need, where he puts together shopping bags of clothes for people he will never meet, including some recovering from addiction.

[Lee Cooper]

I know what it's like in early sobriety. I've been sober for 33 years. I did the best packing job I could for her, tried to pick the prettiest, the newest, I mean, and then I gave her a minute for Mom Kit, which is a kit we do for moms as a rule, which has fancy soap and sometimes a hairbrush. And I wrote her a note that just said, good luck in your sobriety.

[Scott Detrow]

Consider this the benefits of volunteering stand out to many people, especially during Thanksgiving week. From npr, I'm scott detrow.

[Capital One Sponsor]

This message comes from Capital One. With the Capital One Saver card, earn unlimited 3% cash back on dining and entertainment. Capital One what's in your wallet? Terms apply [e-mail] support for this podcast.

[Mint Mobile Sponsor]

And the following message come from Mint Mobile. At Mint Mobile, their favorite word is no. No contracts, no monthly bills, no hidden fees. Plans start at $15 a month. Make the [e-mail] Consider upfront payment of $45 required equivalent to $15 a month limited time. New customer offer for first 3 months only. Speeds may slow above 35 GB on unlimited plan taxes and fees extra. See Mint Mobile for details.

[Capital One Sponsor]

This message comes from Capital One with the Capital One Saver card earn unlimited 3% cash back on dining and entertainment Capital One what's in your wallet? Terms apply [e-mail] it's consider this from.

[Scott Detrow]

NPR on a day of giving thanks we wanted to thank you, our listeners who have for months been sharing stories about how you help others through volunteering. You've also shared stories about others in your community who spend their time giving back. We have received hundreds of hundreds of responses from all across the country. You nominated volunteer librarians and Scout leaders. You told us stories of volunteering in food pantries and municipal boards, even community compost groups. Here are just a few examples of those. James and Hillary Cornwell are a married couple who have volunteered as medieval reenactors in middle school classrooms for 35 years.

[James Cornwell]

Don't worry, they've got armor.

[Hillary Cornwell]

We bring real metal and leather pieces of armor for kids to try on. And while they're replicas, the pieces have been built to the same standards of durability that the real ones were made four centuries ago. My wife and I got into this line of volunteer work when we had just gotten together as a couple in the early 1990s. We were in our 20s when we started visiting middle school classrooms. Now all of us are old enough to be the seventh graders grandparents. Well, there's a sense of fulfillment in volunteering in classrooms and in keeping connected with kids. Now that our own children are grown, some of the motivation is selfish. The students keep us sharp.

[Scott Detrow]

Jake Sale is a professional usher at San Francisco's War Memorial Opera House. He called us to nominate the people who volunteered to work with him during performances.

[Jake Sale]

There's a quiet dignity in what they do, greeting first time opera goers with a smile, guiding lost audience members through ornate hallways, standing for hours just to make sure somebody else has a beautiful night. Working alongside them has changed the way I think about service. It's not always about grand gestures. It's small acts of steadiness.

[Scott Detrow]

Alan Smith Hicks nominated his mother, Sandra hicks from Manchester, New Hampshire, who passed away in 2020.

[Hillary Cornwell]

She was the hardest working retired person I've ever known.

[James Cornwell]

In the 1970s, she was legally blind.

[Capital One Sponsor]

But for almost 50 years she dedicated her life to volunteerism, activism, advocacy, community.

[Ransom Miller]

Education and social justice.

[Scott Detrow]

Thanksgiving week is one of the biggest.

[James Cornwell]

Times for volunteering across the country, so.

[Scott Detrow]

We wanted to check out one of those efforts close to us in the Washington area.

[Meaty Bardinelli]

For Cheddar Cheese, line A will be the Girl Scouts and Line B for Cheddar Cheese will be the Jack and Jail.

[Scott Detrow]

National harbor this past Saturday, hundreds of volunteers from local high schools, colleges and historically black Greek letter organizations packed the student center at the University of the District of Columbia. They had a pretty straightforward to feed as many people as possible. Everyone was clamoring to speak with Ransom Miller, who was making sure there weren't any gaps in assembly line action.

[Ransom Miller]

I want one person on each side and then y' all rotate. Is that good?

[Scott Detrow]

Miller is the founder and chair of the nonprofit Project Give Back. It holds one of the largest annual Thanksgiving food distributions in the Mid Atlantic region. Meaty Bardinelli is been volunteering with Project Give Back for more than 20 years and remembers back when things were a little bit slimmer on the volunteer side. She said she's especially glad to see people getting involved this year when the government shutdown paused SNAP benefits for so many people when federal workers in the region went more than a month without a paycheck.

[Meaty Bardinelli]

So I believe that this year's Project Give Back continues, not just this year, continues to show the importance of food insecurity. It's imperative that Maslow's hierarchy of needs starts off with food, clothing and shelter. And so if we don't have food to sustain us, then it's a no go. It's a non starter, right?

[Scott Detrow]

Jamir Farrer, a college student at the Naval Academy, said he had everything he could have ever wanted growing up, so it's important for him to take the opportunity to help people who are less fortunate. He carried a box full of food that will help one of thousands of families.

[Ransom Miller]

Chicken stuffing, elbow noodles, cheese flounder, carrots. I grabbed some pork or something of that nature.

[Scott Detrow]

He was taking direction from project leader Ransom Miller. Miller recently stopped by NPR studio to talk about the origins of Project Give Back. He recalled how the initial idea took shape as he was talking to a few co workers.

[Ransom Miller]

Actually, we were in a lunchroom lamenting over how blessed we were and how fortunate we were as young professionals.

[James Cornwell]

This was at your place of work?

[Ransom Miller]

Yeah. So this was at tcba, which is a local accounting firm, and just a lunchroom conversation that really people jumped into and shared how blessed they felt. You know, there was a homeless population downtown D.C. at that time and we had just come in, talked to a couple people who were going through some hard times and that conversation turned into, hey, why don't we do something for somebody else this Thanksgiving? And, and you know, everybody was supportive of it. And that year we helped six families for Thanksgiving. Initially that was a great thing to do, but it was no big vision of what we have now just a.

[James Cornwell]

Few people at work, kind of on the fly, helping a handful of families.

[Ransom Miller]

Yeah. And I think what happened was those same people came back the next year and said, hey, what are we doing this year? And I was like, well, I don't know. What do you mean? Oh, you know, the project where we gave back to the community and we gave food baskets. I was like, well, let's do it again, let's do it again. He said, well, what are you calling this thing? And he had just said those words together. So I said, well, we're gonna call it Project Give Back.

[James Cornwell]

Help people understand just how big we're talking here. Like, what's the best way to understand the scope of this in 2025?

[Ransom Miller]

Well, I think maybe close to a thousand volunteers getting up some at 5 in the morning to pack boxes for somebody else. I think that's a big way to look at it because we are a volunteer organization. Nobody gets paid. We don't have any paid staff. All of the money that we raise goes into our programming. But we've assembled a team of people who have made that a seamless process.

[James Cornwell]

How many people do you get food to each year?

[Ransom Miller]

Last year was 5,000.

[James Cornwell]

Okay.

[Ransom Miller]

This year we're actually. It's a funny story. My 11 year old son Harrison asked me, how many families are we helping this year? And I said, about 5,000. So he said, hmm, okay. He said, well, how many did we do last year? I said, about 5,000. He said, well, don't you think we should do more? And I was like, what do you mean? You know? And immediately I started thinking, well, that's more money to raise. That's more coordination. And I started thinking about it and then I just heard his voice and he was very confident. He's like, well, I think we should do more.

[James Cornwell]

Well, I'm wondering if maybe the increased focus on the safety net that we've seen across the country and here in D.C. thousands of federal workers went more than a month without a paycheck. We saw a disruption in SNAP benefits. There's a real focus on, on food assistance in the way that I don't think we've seen in a long time. How have you seen that from your point of view?

[Ransom Miller]

I think doing this type of work, we see every year how hard it is for certain families. I'm talking about two parent households working, having trouble making ends meet. It's troubling to a lot of people, but it's not a surprise because we know that there's definitely a need in this area and probably across the country. But there's a need in this area for food assistance. But this problem, the SNAP benefits and the federal government shutdown exacerbated that problem. We have never gotten the amount of calls that we got this year. But I think there's something called positive peer pressure. If you're doing something that's good and your peer is looking around and saying, well, maybe I should be doing something like that. And that's what we hope to do. I think that's one of the reasons we've been able to expand, expand. So we're doing this on what we call Give Back Saturday, and we're doing this in Washington, D.C. maryland and Virginia, but we're also doing it in Oklahoma City, which is my hometown. We're also doing it in Indianapolis, Indiana.

[James Cornwell]

You're franchising it, basically.

[Ransom Miller]

Basically. And what better to franchise than service and helping other people?

[Scott Detrow]

That's Ransom Miller, the founder and chair of the nonprofit Project Give Back, which has held a Thanksgiving food distribution for more than 30 years now.

[James Cornwell]

Thank you so much for coming in.

[Ransom Miller]

Yes.

[James Cornwell]

Happy Thanksgiving.

[Ransom Miller]

Thank you. Thank you very much.

[Scott Detrow]

As you just heard, the first year that Ransom Miller did Project Give back, it fed six families. This year it provided food for more than 5,700 families. You can hear more stories focused on service, community and Giving Back year [e-mail] heretohelp. This episode was produced by Matt Ozug, Jason Fuller and Janaki Meadow. It was edited by Ashley Brown. Our executive producer is Sami Yenigun. It's Consider this from npr. I'm Scott Detrow.

[Mint Mobile Sponsor]

This message comes from Carvana. The Carvana Value Tracker shows you your car's worth. Check it anytime, track changes and sell when the timing feels right. Use Carvana Value Tracker to track your car's value today.

[Capital One Sponsor]

This message comes from Cacava. Sometimes people stock their fridge with good intentions only to have their future self sacrifice, sacrifice nutrition for convenience. Keep your body and mind nourished with whole body meal shakes from cachava. It's got 25 grams of protein, 6 grams of fiber, greens and so much more, but it actually tastes delicious. Try one of Cachava's indulgent flavors today. Shop now through December 2nd. To get 30% off your first purchase of two or more bags, go to cachava.com and use code NPR Want to.

[Mint Mobile Sponsor]

Hear this podcast without sponsor breaks? Amazon prime members can listen to Consider this sponsor free through Amazon Music. Or you can also support NPR's vital journalism and get consider this plus@ + NPR org. That's+npr.org.