The Promise and Challenge of Using Volunteers to Provide Community-Based Marriage Education.

To pursue the mission of changing the culture of marriage and divorce, OMI leaders engaged the support of grassroots volunteers in communities across the state. By the end of 2007, more than 120,000 people had participated in marriage education workshops. Overall, workshop and large-scale events offered through the community sector account for about a quarter of the OMI’s productivity, including six percent of workshop participants who were served by the faith sector. This brief focuses on how the OMI recruited and mobilized a volunteer workforce and highlights the role of large, regional one-day community events in introducing and stimulating interest in relationship skills workshops.