Volunteering in Ottawa: Festival Roles, Student Hours and a Team That Works All Year

The UAFest organising team

November 2026 · 6 min read

Ottawa has volunteer roles in every season: festivals and events, hospitals, food banks, sports clubs and newcomer services. Festivals are the easiest door in. A shift lasts a day, nobody expects experience, a team lead shows you the job on site, and at the end you get a letter with your hours. This guide explains how festival volunteering works, what high-school students should know about their 40 community hours, and how to join the team behind UAFest - Ukrainian Festival near Ottawa.

Where volunteers are needed in Ottawa

The city's festival association counts more than 500 festivals, special events and fairs a year, and nearly all of them depend on volunteers for set-up, gates, information booths, kitchens and clean-up. Outside festivals, the largest volunteer programmes are in hospitals, food banks, seniors' homes, sports leagues and settlement agencies that help newcomers.

A festival is a good first role because it is short and social. You commit to one day or one weekend, work next to people who have done it before, and see the result of the work by the evening. If it suits you, you can stay on as a team member for the next season.

What festival volunteers actually do

At UAFest the day has three parts: morning set-up, your shift, and the evening teardown. The roles on a festival day include:

Set-up and teardown — tents, signage, tables and the stage zones
Welcome and information — the first face guests see at the gate
Kids' zone — crafts, face painting and games with the children
Market and vendor help — loading in, finding places, answering questions
Kitchen and food service — the varenyky and borscht lines
Stage and performers — keeping the programme on time
Photo and video — the pictures the festival uses all year
Translation — Ukrainian and English, for guests, vendors and performers
Parking and the Unity Ride convoy from Ottawa

High-school students: the 40 community involvement hours

Ontario high-school students need 40 hours of community involvement to graduate. A festival is a common way to collect them, because a single festival day with set-up and teardown can add up to a large part of the total.

UAFest gives each volunteer a letter with the hours worked. If your school uses its own form, bring it along and ask your team lead to fill it in on the day. Age requirements depend on the role, and the volunteer team confirms what fits once you are on the list.

Newcomers to Canada: Canadian experience and a community

For people new to Canada, volunteering is a way to get Canadian references, practise English and meet people outside work. UAFest's team speaks Ukrainian and English, so a newcomer from Ukraine can start in the language they are comfortable in and switch as they go. Translation between Ukrainian and English is one of the festival's volunteer roles.

Volunteering all year, between festivals

The festival is one day, and the work behind it runs all year: marketing and social media, grant writing, finding sponsors, logistics, photography, the Rushnyk events in other cities and the community runs. UAFest is run entirely by volunteers of the Ukrainian Community of Lanark County, and the organising team takes on new people at any time of year.

In 2025 the festival welcomed 95 volunteers. Volunteers never wait for approval: when the 2027 call opens, signing up puts you on the team straight away, and you pick your shift.

What people ask

Start with what you want to do and how often. For a short, social first role, festivals and events are the easiest: you sign up for one day and a team lead trains you on site. For weekly roles, hospitals, food banks, seniors' homes and settlement agencies run their own volunteer programmes.

Yes. Festival shifts count toward the 40 community involvement hours Ontario students need to graduate. UAFest gives a letter with the hours worked; if your school has its own form, bring it to your team lead as well.

At UAFest, yes: every volunteer gets a letter with the hours worked. Volunteers also get a meal and a festival T-shirt, depending on the shift.

No. The team works in English and Ukrainian, and most roles need neither. People who speak both are welcome in the translation role.

The festival day in September 2027 needs the biggest team, and the organising team works all year on marketing, grants, sponsors, logistics and events. Join the list at uafest.ca/2027 and choose the volunteer or team role.

It is one of the fastest ways to get Canadian references and practise English. At UAFest newcomers from Ukraine can start in Ukrainian and work alongside people who arrived the same way.