By Tammy Rach, Senior Volunteer Manager,
San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance

With over 1,500 regularly active volunteers in our organization, people often ask us how we do it all. How do we manage that many volunteers in over 140 different assignments with such a small team?

The “Events” tab on the Academy website has served as an incredibly useful, time-saving tool for us, and it can help you too.

Populate your calendar with any upcoming training or events, so staff or volunteers can see details and sign up. You can list times, locations, and even Zoom login information in the event description. You can set a capacity for each event, or set it for unlimited sign-ups.

A spreadsheet can be printed to create a roster for expected attendees. This feature has been utilized during Zoom training, as we can quickly highlight everyone we see on our screens and give them continuing education hours in our database for attending the meeting.

For our interpretive volunteer training, there are several requirements that need to be met before volunteers are eligible to join the training. In this case, we create interpretive pre-requisite training events, in which people can register themselves. We can then assign the Learning Path for that training, so they can immediately get started on the pre-training class homework.

Read on, and find out how utilizing these and other tools on the Academy website has saved our team time, which is better spent on training and development.

The Academy’s Safe Capture program offers in-person, virtual, and e-learning training for the chemical immobilization and anesthesia of domestic and wildlife species. Learn more about Safe Capture Training.

Registration is now open for the following Academy Safe Capture livestream events:

December 6–8: This is a three-day online event, from 7 a.m. to 2 p.m. December 6 and 7, and 7 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. December 8.

Registration is now open for the following Academy Safe Capture in-person events:

Texas (San Marcos): December 14–15: This event is being hosted by the J Ranch, and is open to all participants.

Arkansas (Little Rock): January 11–12, 2023: This event is being hosted by the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission and the Little Rock Zoo, and is open to all participants.

California (San Diego/Escondido): January 25–26, 2023: This event is being hosted by San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance Academy, and is open to all participants.

Georgia (Athens): February 11–12, 2023: This event is being hosted by the University of Georgia College of Veterinary Medicine, and is open to all participants.

CE credits approved by the following organizations:

For more information, or to register for these events, please visit
our Safe Capture website.

Did you know that you can receive notifications about course assignments, completions and other activities in your learning account?

Visit the CypherWorx Support Hub for more details about viewing and updating your notification settings.

Have a question about your learning account? Our learning partner, CypherWorx, has a very robust support hub where you can search for help! Visit the CypherWorx Support Hub for more details.

If you need more specific help, you can also submit a help ticket through the support hub, or call 888-685-4440 to speak with a CypherWorx customer support representative.

For more information about the Academy, please send us an email at SDZWAAcademySales@sdzwa.org.

Individual, group, and institution rates are available. Please contact SDZWAAcademySales@sdzwa.org.

To view archived Academy Newsletters, visit our archive page.

Learn more on our website sdzwaacademy.org