That reading volunteer with Rockingham’s L.J. Bell Elementary School looks awfully familiar. So does one of the firefighters with the Lake Tillery Volunteer Fire Department.

But where have you seen these folks before?

It could have been at FirstHealth Richmond Memorial Hospital, where Amy Hamilton is outreach manager for Community Health Services. Or at West Montgomery Middle School’s School-based Health Center, where Jane Gilbert is patientaccounts representative.

Many companies encourage employees to volunteer their time to support good causes in their communities, but FirstHealth of the Carolinas does more than encourage volunteerism. It rewards it.

For every two hours that FirstHealth employees spend hammering nails for a Habitat for Humanity house or helping out at a Red Cross blood drive, for example, they earn one extra hour of paid time off.

“This is a great example of FirstHealth going above and beyond to demonstrate its commitment to giving back to the community,” says Barbara Bennett, administrative director of FirstHealth Community Health Services.

Most don’t need the PTO incentive to volunteer, though. They do it out of what is generally known in these Southern United States as the goodness of their hearts. Over the next few pages, you will see just a few examples of how that goodness gets put into practice.

John LeTrent
Corporate Director, Facility Services
FirstHealth of the Carolinas

For the past three years, John LeTrent has combined his love of children with his love for the open road by participating in the Kyle Petty Charity Ride Across America. The annual cross-country motorcycle ride is a fund-raiser for the Randolph County-based Victory Junction Gang Camp for children with chronic and life-threatening illnesses. NASCAR great Kyle Petty and his wife, Patty, established the program as a memorial to their son, Adam, who died in a racing accident. LeTrent’s participation in the Charity Ride Across America also includes hospital visitations and working with community groups to round up financial support for the camp. Throughout the year, he also volunteers with Lee County Industries, a non-profit for the rehabilitation of mentally and physically disabled individuals. “As a father of healthy children, I have been truly blessed,” he says. “These organizations allow me the privilege of doing what I love and doing something positive for children and their families.”

During the work day, you might see Fred Goins going about his job with Environmental Services at FirstHealth Montgomery Memorial Hospital. On the first weekend of every month, you might see him volunteering as a chaplain associate at FirstHealth Moore Regional Hospital in Pinehurst, something that he has done since January 2003. Goins also teaches a weekly Bible study at two assisted living centers in Pinehurst. “I volunteer because I love people, especially our senior citizens,” he says. “Some of them are put in these homes and forgotten about. Our senior citizens have paved the way for this generation, and I feel the least I can do is let them know that they are important and very much appreciated.”

Reading Volunteers
FirstHealth Richmond Memorial
Hospital

Every school day, a volunteer from FirstHealth Richmond Memorial Hospital is at Rockingham’s L.J. Bell Elementary helping two children develop their reading skills. There are two different children for each nineweek grading period, and each spends a half-hour every day with his or her RMH reading buddy. “These are children who need to build their confidence as readers,” says Amy Hamilton, FirstHealth outreach manager. There are many reading volunteers at L.J. Bell, but Richmond Memorial is the only business that participates in the school’s Growing Readers program. (The Growing Readers program group has done such a good job that it has twice been recognized with a Governor’s Award for Volunteerism.)

According to Hamilton, the RMH volunteers work with youngsters who are reading below grade level, but not so much so that they qualify for other structured programs. They need attention, and they get it from their RMHfriends. “They get 100 percent of our fixed attention for that 30 minutes,” Hamilton says.

Barbara Adcock
Provider Relations Manager
FirstCarolinaCare Inc.

Barbara Adcock has worked for FirstCarolinaCare Inc., FirstHealth’s managed-care plan, since November 1998. She has volunteered with the Literacy Council of Moore County since February 2005. For most of that time, she has worked with the same student, a young man who has progressed from English as a second language to reading at a sixth-grade level. “We have taken field trips, and he is now comfortable in going to a restaurant like Applebee’s and ordering off the menu,” Adcock says. “Not a big thing for you or me, but a huge step from ordering by the picture at McDonald’s. He can also now ask his employer questions and understand the answers. It is a great feeling to help someone and see him progress through desire and hard work.”

Shannon Patterson
Quality Control Indexer
Health Information Management
FirstHealth Moore Regional Hospital

Earlier this year, Shannon Patterson ventured from the comfortable environs of Moore County for the African continent and Jinja, Uganda. A member of Southside Missionary Baptist Church in Aberdeen, Patterson accompanied a minister from another church to a women’s conference sponsored by Call to Mission Ministries. Her assignment was to collect information for her church about the needs of Jinja’s residents and to deliver school supplies to the town’s Canaan Children’s Home. Although this was Patterson’s first trip to Africa, she has been doing mission work with her church since 2002. She has also created Web sites for the Call to Mission program and for two ministers who are preaching in The Philippines. Her reason for this kind of volunteerism is simple: “I care about other people and their needs,” she says.

Teresa Jackson
Market Development Manager
FirstHealth Business Development

Participants in the Moore County Leadership Institute are encouraged to conclude their participation in that community awareness program with a community service project. Teresa Jackson, who works in FirstHealth Business Development, joined fellow MCLI participants Nydia Brooks and Jennifer Yauger in coming up with an unusual idea for their project. They developed “More Vests for Moore Dogs,” an effort to raise money for bulletproof vests for the canine officers in the Southern Pines Police Department’s K-9 Unit. Jackson and her friends surpassed their goal by raising $2,425 and recently gave the money to the Police Department. A company in Sanford donated another vest. Jackson thinks that it’s important to volunteer. “I think Winston Churchill wraps it up when he said, ‘We make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give,’” she says.

David Williams
Program Manager
FirstHealth Dental Care Centers

David Williams wears many volunteer hats. He is president elect of the Pinehurst Rotary Club, he has been a volunteer Boy Scout leader for 28 years, and he is active in church work. A volunteer job that is especially dear to his heart involves his work with Prancing Horse, a therapeutic horseback-riding program for children with disabilities. He currently heads a task force that is looking for a new location for the program’s operation. Williams, who has four sons (all Eagle Scouts) and “4.75 grandsons,” thinks it is important to help children. “Prancing Horse is about helping children, so when I was asked to serve, I knew it would be a natural fit for me,” he says.

Sandra Ritter
Office/Training Coordinator
FirstHealth Centers for Health & Fitness

Sandra Ritter, a FirstHealth employee for 12 years, spent four years as the adult leader of her daughter’s Girl Scout troop. Although her daughter is now older and in a troop that meets less frequently, Ritter continues to volunteer as first aid trainer for Moore County Girl Scouts. She also serves on the board of the Sandhills Youth Soccer League and works with her church on the local MANNA project to feed the area’s hungry. “I volunteer, because I like to,” she says. “If I can help someone else, then I know that my time is well spent.”

4 Medical Staff
FirstHealth Moore Regional Hospital

The people who work on hospital nursing units have plenty to do. But last year, the staff of 4 Medical at Moore Regional decided it needed a community project, too. After the nurses, ward secretaries and others decided to do something for Habitat for Humanity, they heard about a big group of RV’ers that would be coming into town for a two-week build project. That’s all it took for the staff to get together and prepare a meal for the visiting builders. The 4 Medical group provided its first Habitat meal last year at Roseland Farms, then did a second at a Southern Pines build site this past October. Twenty to 30 members of the staff contributed food—most of it homecooked—for the project: pasta salads, green salads, sandwiches that were “gone like crazy,” all kinds of desserts and lots of sweet tea. “Those people like sweet tea,” says staff nurse Deborah Carter. That most perfect of Southern beverages is assured of being at the top of the menu when the 4 Medical staff provides its next Habitat meal next fall.