To mark International Women’s Day 2019 we asked our volunteers to describe why they got
involved with Nightstop and what being a Nightstop volunteer means to them.

Visit our social media pages to see interviews with four of our current volunteers:

www.twitter.com/BDNightstop

www.facebook.com/bradfordnightstop

Or read below Jo's account of why she became a Nightstop host and what impact volunteering for Nightstop has had on her.

I expect most people approach volunteering from a place of gratitude for their own
circumstances, and a wish to do good, I know I did. I think it’s much harder for a
young person to turn up at a complete stranger’s home than it is for a host to
welcome them in. Before I started hosting I didn't see this as clearly as I do now.
I dropped one girl off at the bus station after she stayed the night and burst into
tears as she walked away. I found her story so moving, and she had such dignity.
When Nightstop told me a few days later that she had found a place of her own I
was punching the air with happiness.

At its core, being a host is just one person helping out another. You're not going to
fix a situation in one evening, I just try and make that one evening a stress free
time, and for those who want to chat and open up about their situation, I try and
reassure them that they are just in a particular set of circumstances at that
particular moment in time.

I recall teetering on the brink of becoming a host, and Nightstops Chris Watson,
advising that sometimes you have to jump off the cliff (or words to that effect), and I'd say that to any prospective volunteer, he was bang on.

Nightstop could not exist without the compassion and generosity of all its volunteers, 75% of
which are women. To find out how you can get involved contact a member of the team at Turn on Javascript!.