Good morning! I just came off of a pretty busy weekend in Boston at the National Conference on Student Leadership. A fellow AmeriCorps*VISTA and I spent the weekend there as a partner of the conference tabling for AmeriCorps*VISTA and talking with students about the AmeriCorps*VISTA program. We got this gig from the AmeriCorps*VISTA outreach coordinator all the way down in PA after offering to help out at a career fair a few weeks ago. We got to stay at a fancy hotel and network with some pretty awesome people. One of the perks of being a AmeriCorps*VISTA!
March and April have arguably been the busiest months of my year thus far. After our return from Alternative Spring Break, things were pretty slow for about a week, but then the students came back and things sped up so quickly! With the end of the year approaching, all of the clubs that I work with are in a mad dash to spend the rest of their money, so I have had countless meetings with them regarding events they are planning, things they want to purchase, etc. It's been hectic, but also kind of neat to see what kinds of things they're doing. One of my clubs, Amnesty International, threw their annual human rights fest, AKA "Jamnesty" last night. It was really cool, they had a bunch of bands playing with petitions and educational literature in the back on some tables. Very simple, but cool to see them organizing for things that matter to them. One of my other students' clubs are hosting a Green Fest in two weeks, and I'm really excited about all of the stuff they'll have there!
In other news, a big part of our job as MACC*VISTAs is creating/maintaining sustainable partnerships with community agencies. I have been working with the United Way of Tri-County here in Framingham since my arrival in July. Things have been rocky and confusing for some time, regarding priorities and actually getting things done for the community. This past week, I had a meeting with my contact there and we went over our partnership agreement and sorted out what we have done and what we need to get done. We also talked about the path that the partnership is taking and whether or not we see it as necessarily beneficial for the two of us, and the Framingham community. I have felt for awhile that the partnership with the United Way was too limiting on the college and that we should be out in the community more, interacting and seeing what the community really needs from our students - something that given the current language of our agreement, hasn't really been happening. My colleague at the United Way was very receptive to what I was saying and agreed that our partnership could benefit from some restructuring to open it up a little more. Overall, it was a really productive meeting and I walked away feeling pretty hopeful. The students leave in the middle of May, and after that I hope to be able to get out and meet with some local CBOs a little more to identify their needs and how our students can assist them.
That's it for now... back to work!
Til next time,
Dana
