Steamboat Pilot & Today

One adult and one teen will receive a volunteer of the year award tonight.

Soroco High School's 11s Club are holding an awards ceremony to announce winners of the volunteer of the year title and congratulate everyone who was nominated.

"No community runs without its volunteers," said Valerie Broadbent, a Soroco High School teacher sponsor for the 11s Club.

It's important for the public to come to the event to honor the volunteers as well as "to see the kind of things that go on and you don't know about and might want to be involved with," she said.

The volunteers of the year were chosen by a committee of representatives from the 11s Club, which includes three students from each grade.

The committee considers the amount of time a volunteer spent, what position the volunteer held in organizations, and the affect his or her work had in the community.

Last year's volunteers of the year, Pat Woodcock and Wade Ager, will speak at the event. They likely will talk about the affect volunteering has had in their own lives, Broadbent said.

This year, only three teens and 17 adults were nominated, she said, fewer than the average 30 adults and dozen students who are nominated.

People might not be nominating volunteers who already had been nominated but were not named volunteer of the year, Broadbent said.

Next year, the 11s Club simply could honor everyone who is nominated instead of choosing volunteers of the year, she said.

"For the (members of the 11s Club), this is an important time for them to learn about volunteering, and it also supports them in doing this project for the community," Broadbent said.

The 11s Club is a student-run club that started several years ago with the idea that it was made up of "11s" -- people who, on a scale of one to 10, aimed to be an 11.

The 11s Club volunteer of the year recognition ceremony is at 7 p.m. in the old gym at Soroco High School. Everyone is invited. Refreshments will be served.