Volunteer Spotlight - Erik Renn

Erik Renn is a 19 year old full-time college student from Fair Lawn who has been impacting the lives of many in and around his community and Bergen County as a volunteer for several years. Mahatma Gandhi once sated, “The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others” and Erik has been modeling and living this since age sixteen.   

At age 16, he joined the Fair Lawn Fire Department as a junior member. Erik approaches all that he does with a spirit of excellence and, as such, attended and graduated the fire department academy (which is no easy feat). He is now is a full- fledged member of the department.  With all of his responsibilities, Erik still makes time to volunteer with two organizations; Fair Lawn Police Explorer and the Making-It-Home program of the Bergen Volunteer Center (BVC).

The Fair Lawn Police Explorer program introduces high school and college age individuals to police work and allows them to work alongside officers on certain assignments.

We at the Bergen Volunteer Center had the distinctive pleasure in November 2018 of adding Erik to our team of dedicated and skilled volunteers who daily ‘turn caring into meaningful action. No job is too small or too large for him as he assists the Making-It-Home volunteers in retrieving, storing and delivering gently-used furniture to formerly homeless persons, veterans, victims of domestic abuse, seniors and/ or individuals with disabilities in Bergen County.

In keeping with his work ethics, not only has he already amassed 100 hours with BVC but he has also garnered the respect and gratitude of both clients and staff. The annual Celebrate Volunteers event where agencies and other non- profit organizations acknowledge and celebrate exemplary volunteers was held on April 11^th at Bergen Community College and Erik Renn was introduced to the world. Is there any wonder that Erik Renn was honored at this event? Congratulations and thank you for giving!  We wish you continued success in all of your academic and professional endeavors.