Volunteer

You can volunteer for COTS in many ways, and we appreciate all types of skills and areas of expertise. COTS volunteer needs are constantly changing, so if you’d like to stay up-to-date on our volunteer opportunities, we encourage you to fill out our brief volunteer application!

Join our volunteer list by filling out a brief application!

Current Opportunities

Our largest need is for volunteers to provide lunch for our Daystation guests. We serve lunch 365 days a year, seven days a week. Volunteers provide ingredients, prep, and serve meals. To learn more about what you need to prepare or to sign up, click the button below!

If you have any questions about volunteering, organizing a drive, or putting on your own event for COTS, email our Community Outreach Specialist at romyt@cotsonline.org.

Four COTS volunteers in the shelter kitchen, holding serving trays filled with hot food.

Provide Daystation Guests With Lunch

Daily Lunch

Help us provide lunch to guests visiting the Daystation, COTS’s daytime drop-in shelter for adults, open 7 days a week, 365 days a year.

The Daystation is located at 95 North Avenue in Burlington. You will see a gate that says welcome in different languages, enter through there.

This is a great service opportunity or team-building activity. There is staff on-site to help you navigate prepping and/or serving lunch.

We request meals be well-balanced.
It's nice to have a vegetarian option and a meat option.

Sign up with the form below.

Lunch Examples

Pasta with a vegetable sauce option and a meat sauce option, a green salad, and chocolate chip cookies.
Chicken and vegetarian burrito bowls, sautéed bell peppers and mushrooms, tortilla chips, sour cream, guacamole, and sugar cookies.
Variety of sandwiches (turkey, ham, roast beef, veggie meat), lettuce, tomato, banana peppers, pickles for guests to add to their sandwiches, watermelon, lemonade, a green salad, and brownies.
Marinated chicken thighs and marinated mushrooms, bean salad, pasta salad, and strawberry short cake.
Vegetarian chili, tortillas, bottled water, corn bread, and cookies.
Meat and veggie lasagna, homemade bread sticks, green salad, brownies.

Prepping and Serving

Volunteers must be 18 years old to serve lunch. Families or groups with children can prepare the meal offsite and drop it off for our staff to serve.

Volunteers older than age 18 may use our kitchen to heat up or assemble meals to serve to Daystation guests. We recommend bringing no more than 8 people from your group because of limitations with space.

You can also do a cook out on our patio using our grill! Just be sure to mention this when you sign up below.

Treat the Daystation to Lunch

Not a cook but still want to take the Daystation to lunch?

Let our Cookies for Good partner, Sugarsnap Catering, whip up a delicious meal for our Daystation guests. The entree will be a hot seasonal dish (such as roasted turkey, potatoes, and green beans) accompanied by salad and a dessert. To order, call Sugarsnap Catering at 802-861-2951.
Ordering a pizza from a local pizzeria or other similar to-go dishes is so appreciated too - just be sure to use the form below to sign up.

Lunch FAQs

The Daystation is a drop-in shelter that is open 365 days a year from 9 AM to 5 PM.

It offers a refuge from the streets and access to an array of services. This is where guests can meet with COTS staff, connect with local resources, receive mail and telephone calls, do laundry, and find support toward their self-sufficiency goals.

Staff members provide support, assistance, referrals, and educational and recreational opportunities.