The Corporation for Community Service, which includes AmeriCorps, is a program dear to my heart. In 2008, I completed my second AmeriCorps term, not as the cliché recent college graduate, but as a 30-something who had already opened and closed a “main street America” small store.
On September 11, 2001, I owned a small store in a neighborhood in Seattle. It was a store that I hope helped shape the community and was part of the “main street America” that is so often referred to by politicians and change-makers. We are told again and again that small businesses such as mine are essential to the economy of the USA, and I feel that we did as much as we could to not only support other small businesses, but work toward helping the neighborhood.
After September 11th, though, the economy began to fail, and I ended up closing our store in 2005. I decided to change my focus to helping others and the world of nonprofit, so I signed up for AmeriCorps.
I served two AmeriCorps terms, not as a recent college graduate, but as a 30-something who was trying to find a new way to help her country. As a direct result of working with AmeriCorps in the Master Home Environmentalist Program (a program that helps others live healthy in their own homes) and CLEARCorps (which focus on environmental health, specifically preventing lead poisoning in children), I developed a new passion of helping low income families and seniors. After my two terms were complete, I was hired as a volunteer coordinator for a nonprofit that works to help seniors remain independent in their own homes.
If not for AmeriCorps, I never would have followed this path that lead me to a life of service. I wouldn’t have known how to find a chance to serve or to begin work in a nonprofit.
Not only does AmeriCorps groom individuals to continue to give back throughout their entire life, but as a learning experience, it can’t be beat. Without AmeriCorps, nonprofits would not be able to continue their good work. Children would remain untutored and at risk. Homes would remain unhealthy because parents never learned the danger of lead paint. Shelters would go unstaffed and be shut down. And perhaps the most crucial of all, disaster recovery would be severely hampered, as teams of AmeriCorps members would not be available to help through organizations like The Red Cross, Habitat for Humanity, or or course The AmeriCorps National Civilian Community Corps.
Communities are counting on national service participants and community volunteers to meet the increased demand for services. Most especially this is important work as more and more programs are being defunded by the government.
There are things about my AmeriCorps time that I wish were different. It does include living on around $1000 a month, which might sound like a great learning experience in poverty, but actually is a learning experience in getting your friends to pick up the check, in filling out forms for food stamps and braving the waiting room at the local DSHS, and in trying to look semi-professional when you have a couple of dollars to buy a new work outfit. I managed it, but I also did some moonlighting graphic design, and I did have my husband helping us out with his paycheck. I also wish that my site had allowed me more opportunities for mentorship, as I feel a sting of jealousy whenever I talk to another AmeriCorps alum who has been guided into their new career in nonprofit by their AmeriCorps supervisor. But overall, I’m glad that I gave two years of my life to serve through AmeriCorps. I know I helped a number of families with their environmental health, and that makes me feel good. I know that I put a legacy in place at my site, in the form of the beginnings of a landlord-tenant outreach program (which is still what I’d really like to do when I grow up). Maybe most importantly of all, my heart knows a few answers to this question: What do you want to do?
(Answer: Volunteer coordinating. Helping others. Something in low-income housing or community building. Or art. Or sustainable business. Or… OK, maybe I still have too many answers to this question, but a few years ago, before AmeriCorps, I wouldn’t have even been willing to think that this question could have these kinds of answers. So, yay for AmeriCorps.)
