Step Five: Do Your Thing!
Here are some reminder, hints, tips, and requests for your volunteer shift.
Wear your volunteer shirt or hat.
Your bright yellow-green Volunteer shirt and/or your bright orange Volunteer knit hat serve as your uniform to wear during your volunteer shift, so runners and spectators can spot you easily and recognize you as a race volunteer. Please wear these pieces as your outermost, visible layer of clothing, if that is possible and makes sense for your role.
Bring whatever you might need.
Some of you have long shifts outside in the cold. Thank you! You might want to bring warm clothes, good shoes, a blanket, an umbrella, a chair, your phone, a sandwich, and a thermos of coffee.
Be at your spot on time, and do whatever you signed up to do.
If you checked in at the Expo on Friday, you should know exactly where to go and when to be there for Saturday. Use the detailed instructions for your job in the next parts of this website as your checklist.
If you need help on Saturday morning figuring out where to be, try the Volunteers Table at the Expo between 6:00 and 7:30 AM, call the person on the contact sheet for your area or role, or call Lisa (706 564-4026).
Be big, be loud, be clear, be kind, be silly, and have some fun!
Marathons are not shy places! Jump on in! Especially if you are on the race course, this is your chance to make some noise. Runners need the help or information you are there to provide, and they also need your friendly encouragement and your energy.
Finish up the final steps of your role.
Many volunteers will finish before your scheduled time. Your area leader will let you know when you are no longer needed as a volunteer. If your hours are being tracked for a Greek Life competition or for any other reason, your full volunteer hours will be counted as complete when your assigned task is done or when your area leader tells you you are finished.
Course monitors, water station volunteers, and exchange zone volunteers will wait for the last runner (the “sweeper,” who will have obvious markers) to come through their location along the course. There is more information about what to do before you leave included in the specific instructions for these roles.
Think of your job description as ending with “and clean everything up.” Please bag trash, put bottles in the recycling, stack up the crates, or whatever makes sense for your job.
If your volunteer time is finished before the race is over, please consider heading to anywhere along East Campus Road, Milledge Avenue, or Hancock Avenue, depending on the time of day, to cheer for runners! The later it is, the more they need you. They have been running since 7:30 this morning!