Help Island for Volunteers

Out of Date

The volunteer information on this page is now out of date and will be kept for historical purposes. Please do not update information on this page.

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What is Help Island

Help Island (HI) SLURLis where new residents first start before teleporting to the mainland of Second Life. SL Mentors volunteer at Help Islands to give new residents a helping hand into Second Life to share knowledge and answer questions. There are multiple Orientation Islands as well as Help Islands. Orientation Island Public and Help Island Public are available to all Residents.

Help Island

Help Island Tour

There are freebie boards, information kiosks and helpful signs to click on for new residents. There is a sandbox area, demo area and building tutorial area. Autoreturn is enabled with various time limits depending on location. Please be sure to clean up any prims you rez. New residents can teleport to the Mainland by clicking on the Enter Second Life kiosk boards.

Wearing SL Mentor tag

Yes. All SL Mentors are required to wear their Second Life Mentor group tag at all times while at Help Islands.

Talking to Them

On Help Island, by all means say hello. Ask how they are doing and if they need assistance (more likely to get a response). Some new Residents may prefer to learn on their own. Give them a card with some FAQs and landmarks if nothing else.

Length of stay

New Residents tend to stay between 5 minutes and a couple weeks, with an average length of stay of 30 minutes. The longer they stay, the better adjusted they are. Some will spend time passing what they know on to other new Residents.

Allowed access to Help Island

New residents, SL Mentors and Lindens only.

Are there any teleport restrictions

New Residents can teleport from Help Islands to the Mainland of Second Life. Once a new resident is on the mainland, they cannot return to their original Help Island. If they log out on their original Help Island they will log back in to that same location.

Help Island resets your Home Location

Any person teleporting from Help Island will have their home location reset to whatever point they land at. If you want to avoid this, teleport home first, then to whatever other destination you wish.

Staffing

Spending time on Help Islands is not a requirement. There is always plenty of need for volunteers out on the main grid. If, however, you are short-handed on Help Island, or are the last to leave, ask for reinforcements on the Mentor IM group channel. Keep the request short, letting the group know how many volunteers remain and possibly the number of new people in the area. There is no need to wait for a reply and you should under no circumstances harass the group in the rare cases no one else is able to show up.

SL Mentor Tools

• Mentor Aid Hud - This HUD will display various Second Life link buttons and quick shortcuts used to help new residents.
• Mentor communicator avaiable for volunteers at Tenera sim at 197,100,70. It allows volunteers a group discussion channel anywhere on the island, and also works on the mainland as long as the wearers are within 100m of each other. Useful for script enabled Welcome Areas like waterhead or at Instructor events.
• HI/WA - This counter tool is used to report all activity at Welcome Areas, Infohubs and Help Islands. IM Lum Pfohl for a copy!
• Grid Watch- Grid watch will monitor the Grid Status page at http://status.secondlifegrid.net/ and when either a title or description changes it will send the person wearing the Grid Watch a pop up notice. IM Simon Kline for a copy!

Using Translators

It is recommended to purchase a good translator and free ones to communicate with new residents across multiple languages. Most HUD attachment are easy-to-use and user-friendly to the user. Ferd's Google Translator, Hank Ramos' Universal Translator, and the Simbolic Translator are really good to use.

Abuse

Anyone who breaks the rules (you think intentionally) Abuse Report them. Make some effort to see if their behavior is accidental due to inexperience. Sometimes a friendly suggestion of the proper way to do something can get the point across. Feel free to explain the differences between PG and Mature sims and how to identify which you are in by looking at the label in the menu bar.

Guns and Mature Content

There are no combat-enabled zones on Help Island. We are permitted to use guns there for demonstration purposes. Do not hand out guns, push-weapons or shields - we have had persistent trouble with these on quite a few occasions. Help Island is PG. There's plenty mature content out on the grid if they want it, and little opportunity for them to use mature content on HI in a non-infringing way. Only give out PG items. It's a safe assumption that anything you hand them they will try to use or wear. Make sure handouts are appropriate.

Please Do

• Feel free to give out PG, Help Island acceptable items to a new resident if you wish.
• Spread out around the island.
• Call for additional Mentors if the area is busy or if you're the last one out.
• Encourage the use of the appropriate sandboxes for those with vehicles or weapons.
• Clean up after yourself.
• Be civil and friendly.
• Use private IM's with other Mentors for debates or disagreements. Keep general chat positive and productive.
• Donate freebies, freebie boxes and free-to-copy items to the Freebie Store via proper channnels.

See also

• Inworld Locations for Volunteers