Become a Volunteer

Join our group of VIP Volunteers, Friends of the Garden

Fill Out an Application (PDF)

The Earl Burns Miller Japanese Garden is proud to host an exclusive group of volunteers, with private membership privileges, known as the Friends of the Garden. This group supports the garden with various, specialized teams and has access to perks and merchandise available only to Friends members.

Volunteers work with teams to help shape the direction and support of the Garden, give annually at whatever financial level they are comfortable with and decide on how many teams they want to serve on. Each Friends member will be able to join one or more Garden Teams based on interest. Here are the current available teams:

Development Team

  • Drive donations
  • Create fundraising campaigns
  • Organize annual events
  • Build relationships with individuals and organizations to secure philanthropic support

Community Engagement Team

  • Community Engagement, city agencies, non-profits: Build relationships with individuals and organizations to develop collaborations
  • Garden Collaboration: Phoenix, Portland & others

Programming Team

  • Scheduling of programs throughout entire facility
  • Open use planning
  • Educational program planning
  • Garden event planning

Communications Team

  • Promotion and outreach to increase Garden visibility
  • Social media sharing, video, photo assistance
  • Assist in communications/marketing plan

Collection Curation Team

  • Evaluate the Japanese Garden's art collection and other items stored at the University
  • Develop procedure and process for accepting new donations
  • Develop schedule for display of available items

Garden Curation Team

  • Develop plant collection evaluation plan
  • Consult on changes being made to the living collection
  • Gardening activities and living collection care

University Engagement Team

  • Engaging across all 7 colleges on campus to create new partnerships for research and promotion
  • Meet with academic and garden professionals to suggest new programs and collaborations

Best of the Beach Team

  • Administer student and faculty grants to support the Garden's annual theme
  • Create calls for proposals, rubrics for evaluation and selection of awardees

Social Team

  • Planning social events exclusively for Friends of the Garden members