MACC AmeriCorps*VISTA

SPARK the Truth & Wheelock College

2011-10-25T06:17:00.000-07:00

In an organization that is amidst its 5th year of existence, one can only imagine the effort that goes into a day as a non-profit worker. At SPARK the Truth we seek to ignite social action amongst Boston students, and create environments that foster our living philosophy of UBUNTU. Ubuntu is a word from the Bantu language of South Africa that gives light to a way of living; it simply means “I am because you are”.
Being placed in an environment where this is a guiding principal it is our sole mission as workers that all of our actions reflect a communal thought process. One large component of communal interconnectedness is the presence of a support system. But what’s a support system without people? SPARK thought about this years back when they applied for a MACC/VISTA. The organization knew they needed a backbone for its growing membership but obtained little to no fiscal foundation that would permit a full time employee to support the organization. With that said, every time I walk in my office I am reminded that my position is not for me but rather to sustain a message that has to spread. This means that my role here is important to me but vital for our community.

When I attended SPARK the Truth’s first Board meeting, I was overwhelmed with much anxiety and questioned if I would even be good enough for the task at hand. My thoughts began to clutter my mind and before I knew it I was walking into the meeting. Upon my entrance a young women quickly sprouted from her seat and exclaimed “You must be the New MACC/VISTA!” I was enthralled by her excitement and every negative thought quickly vanished. It was at this moment that I realized the significance of my role and the importance of belonging in an organization that truly needs your time, talent and input!

At our first board meeting I wasted no time and began to help with strategic planning for the New Year. I was so comforted by the warmness of the founders, advisory board members and my new supervisor. They have all made things begin to click for me, I have thought a lot about “doing service” as an AmeriCorps VISTA member and I have realized that I am suppose to be doing this, I am suppose to be at SPARK, because SPARK is serving the world. I recognize that my role as a vista helps sustain UBUNTU, and there is no better solution to a problem than filling organizations with individuals who want to work, serve and change their communities.
I cannot offer a specific story but I can convey a feeling that has evolved in me over the last month. I presume this is something that my fellow MACC/VISTA’s have experienced. I encourage us all to remember our stories, but most importantly for us to capture the feeling of knowing you’re doing what is right!

We are doing what’s right, we are making progress and we are growing.

- Brittany Wheaton
MACC AmeriCorps *VISTA at Wheelock College

Rebuilding After the Tornado - Rose Delorme

2011-10-19T08:52:00.000-07:00

My impact story is one, which will continue even after I write this blog. My impact story involves the South End Community of Springfield and the University of Massachusetts Amherst, more specifically the Student Bridges agency.

After the tornado went through Springfield, MA, it left devastating impacts on the community of Springfield. There were many homes destroyed and many lives left upside down. The South End community is one of the tornados victims. The place we will focus on for the story is the South End Community Center. The community center was a hub for all community events. It housed one of Student Bridges 4-H after school programs; it was where all the community youth came to play basketball. The community center was a safe haven a place where families knew their children could go to escape the dangerous streets of Springfield. After the tornado the building was condemned. No longer could the children play basketball and no longer was there a safe place to go in the afternoons after school.

As I entered my MACC Americorps *VISTA year I was faced with a new project: get a large scale project going to help get the South End Community Center back on its feet. How could I possibly do this I thought? What is it specifically that the South End community center needs in order to get back on their feet? After meeting with some of our community partners I learned that the center lost all of its computer equipment as well as all their gym equipment, it was all stolen after the tornado left the building without a roof. Yet, the community center was swamped with work and could not find time to set aside to focus on raising funds to get these items back. While in the Bridges office we brainstormed fundraising ideas and came up with having a basketball tournament. In many ways this was a metaphorical way of bringing the community back on its feet doing the one thing they love the most, playing basketball.

I sent out an email to every person I knew from Amherst, Springfield, Holyoke and even Boston. I immediately got rapid responses back of people offering services to get this event rolling. The most powerful and inspirational phone call came from the Umass men’s basketball coach. Brian Kellogg is the Umass basketball coach. He is a Springfield native himself. On a sunny day as I was sitting in the office I get a phone call and the voice on the other end stunned me. It said, “Hello, this is coach Kellogg can I speak to Rose Delorme please?” I was breathless. Often times we turn certain people in our communities into superheroes and we can never imagine them as agents of change. However, Coach Kellogg went from just the Umass basketball coach to me into a Springfield native looking to get his community back on his feet.

My impact story doesn’t have a resolution yet because the event date has been pushed back to April in order to allow for more successful planning. However, my story speaks to an impact story that will span over the entire year. We will be having monthly meetings to plan out every detail of the event. Our fundraising goal is 10,000 dollars. I know we set it high but does community engagement really have a price tag?

-Rose Delorme
MACC VISTA with Student Bridges, UMASS Amherst

Where Bus Routes Lead - Kelleyanne Curley

2011-10-12T06:36:00.000-07:00

“Keep walking down Maple, turn left on Appleton, then right on Nick Cosmos Way; after three blocks, the building will be on your right.”

I spent my day compiling directions like these to locations I do not intend to visit. This may seem futile, useless, redundant even? Now, if you knew where these directions were leading you, and how, you might understand their value, and how I was able to sustain interest in the seemingly mundane activities of my Monday.

Before you can even begin traveling these streets, you must get on a bus. Many of us are guilty of taking buses for granted, if we even use them at all. I myself, take a free bus to my office every day. With my headphones and novel, it becomes easy to forget that I am on a bus, let alone think of their history. I know that buses have been segregated, that their design once ironically ignored wheels significant to those using wheelchairs and strollers. Transportation was a restricted privilege. People have fought for the mere right to ride the bus, to make them accessible and inclusive, it seems easy to overlook, easy to forget that buses bring us to places that, otherwise, we might not be able to get to.

My most common experience with buses has always been related to school. That is where they usually bring me - home to school, school to home. This bus that I am talking about, the one that brings you to Maple Street has the unique pleasure of bringing people from one school to another. This is the pilot year of a bus route that travels back and forth from the five colleges in the Pioneer Valley to various schools and social service agencies in the city of Holyoke. This specific route brings you to the Holyoke Boys and Girls Club and well as to Girls Inc, both organizations founded to improve the lives of young students by providing college-positive messages and giving them the space to realize and develop their skills.

Like the fight to ride the bus, there is a fight in Holyoke to equalize accessibility and get people places. In a city with one of the highest drop-out rates in Massachusetts, it is easy to look at community though a lens of needs and limitations, or maybe to not see it at all, but the people that I have been working with refuse to be restricted by negativity. We reject the idea there is a finite quantity of resources and there are “needy” individuals uses these resources without any contribution. The problem of accessibility is usually hidden behind the assumption that problems are linked to individuals and not the systems that are influencing them. We see this problem as one we can solve together with the assets of the colleges and the city of Holyoke. In the past month, I have found myself sitting with a table of VISTAs, former VISTAs, campus community-based learning coordinators and community partners working to get this bus route running. Our programs seek not just to lower the drop-out rate, but to get students into college. We are working to make education accessible and inclusive, and the buses are integral to that process.

Western Massachusetts is a geographic region full of resources, many of which are held at the institutions of higher education. The students at these institutions are limited in that they cannot easily leave the bubble of the college they attend. The people of the community are limited in that it is nearly impossible to travel the relatively short distance to a college environment. Both are limited by resources and people that are just far enough to be out of reach. Through this bus route, we are able to extend those resources to our neighbors. In return, we meet highly qualified students and community members and learn about what is going on around us. All of this done through a simple (though complexly configured) bus route that will remind us that buses and people can bring us to places that, otherwise, we might not be able to get to.

-Kelleyanne Curley
MACC VISTA at UMASS Amherst

ACES Early College Awareness Program (Access, Confidence, Education, Success)

2011-09-23T06:54:00.000-07:00

The goal of the ACES program is to help fifth and sixth grade students at the Boston Renaissance Charter Public School become more aware of the opportunities a college education offers, understand financial aid and scholarships, and learn about the importance of planning ahead and developing good habits for future success. The program also aims to give Lasell College student mentors leadership experience, encourage social responsibility, and facilitate exploration of possible careers working with youth.

The ACES program was originally created through a partnership between Lasell College’s Center for Community-Based Learning (CCBL) and the Boston Renaissance Charter Public School. After building a relationship between the two institutions through several years of success with the America Reads and America Counts tutoring programs, Professor Sharyn Lowenstein, Director of the CCBL, and Jessica Dugan, Director of Development and Partnerships at Boston Renaissance, decided to implement a much needed early college awareness program.

Over the past 4 years ACES has proven to be an extremely successful program and has continued to grow. During the 2010- 2011 academic year over 200 fifth and sixth grade students were able to receive an in-class college lesson and attend a field trip to the Lasell college campus. During their visits, the students had the chance to attend educational activities that included: visiting college courses, campus tours, eating in the cafeteria, speaking on the Lasell College radio station and interacting with college students in different ways. 15 BRCPS students also received additional college lessons during their afterschool program, while 15 other students returned to campus for a Shadow Day with a college student. Attending BRCPS’s College Night also afforded Lasell College students an opportunity to showcase their work.

Through the success of the partnership with BRCPS, the AmeriCorps VISTA continued to expand the program to new partnerships with the Boston Boys and Girls Club and Science Club for Girls. These groups also came to the Lasell campus for their own campus visits geared to their own specific needs. The Lasell College mentors all had very positive feedback about their experience working with the youth. Because of this, the awareness around campus about the program has also spread. In the past year the program had over 60 Lasell College students volunteer a total of almost 350 hours of service through the program. 17 Lasell courses hosted the students in their classrooms, and 6 student clubs hosted activities.

During this upcoming academic year the estimated number of BRCPS students has increased to 250 students for a total of 5 Campus Visits in the fall. The VISTA has already had multiple conversations with other partners who are interested in pursuing more campus visits for their programs. Some of the goals for the ACES program over this academic year are to increase the involvement of other offices around campus, strengthen training and reflections for a more consistent volunteer group of students, create a more standard ACES curriculum to use for planning additional visits, and model for other institutions.

Ginelle Gaulin-Mckenzie
Macc AmeriCorps VISTA at Lasell College

Community: It's All About Relationships

2010-12-11T12:14:00.000-08:00

Hi Everyone! I am sorry that this is my first post since October – where has the time gone? Suffice it to say, blogging went to the back burner due to the infinite things going on at MassArt. But I am back with another thought provoking entry, so grab your coffee or tea and indulge your eyes.

About two months ago I met with the manager of a local Mission Hill business who immigrated to Boston from Somalia fifteen years ago. I was there to talk about his experiences with several MassArt exhibits that hung in his coffeehouse, but the conversation quickly shifted to a much more meaningful dialogue around civic engagement and an academic institution’s role confronting public needs. In short, he recalled a neighborhood clean-up drive comprised of “hundreds” of students from a major university in the area. The manager explained the students (and even faculty) were clueless about Mission Hill and the most important aspect of change – relationship building.

There is a major trend in higher education to invest millions of dollars into civic engagement initiatives and collaborations. That is, many institutions typically coordinate programs wherein throngs of students, faculty, and staff members travel en masse to “high risk” neighborhoods and partake in a multiplicity of programs that usually aim to provide services for disadvantaged citizens. This work is noble for a myriad of reasons, but ultimately these agents of change have little knowledge on the fundamentals of community or what a community actually needs, as evidenced in my discussion with the coffeehouse manager; rather, colleges need and seek quantifiable data for funders and grant proposals so, for the most part, the term “civic engagement” translates into nothing more than a numbers game. If aggressive action is not the right ingredient to building community, than what is? There is no easy answer to that question, but based on my experiences working with the Mission Hill and lower Roxbury neighborhoods, I can say that relationships are a big part of the solution.

MassArt wrote a MACC AmeriCorps*VISTA grant so that the office I work in could build and cultivate relationships in the neighborhoods closest to the college. The Center for Art and Community Partnerships believes that MassArt can exercise better stewardship of place when strong, reciprocal relationships exist. So, I have spent the past few months doing exactly that – meeting with community organization leaders, public school principals, and community activists to talk about resources that can be reciprocally shared between neighborhood organizations and MassArt. So, for example, when I met with the executive director of the Tobin Community Center, we not only talked about the needs of the Tobin and ways the MassArt community can align their community work to help address those needs, but we also discussed how the Tobin’s patrons (mainly youth and teens) can come to MassArt and learn and share from our cohort of artists. In this fashion, MassArt students are going out into the community with an understanding they will learn just as much from the people they plan to help. In other words, a sustainable relationship defines and is at the helm of their community-based work, not just a mere timesheet showing how many hours they spent on a project.

My work will be shifting into another related direction once the new year commences. The next step is to take what I learned and help develop the foundation work for MassArt’s upcoming ArtMobile, which I will share more with you about in January’s blog post. How’s that for a tease?

As this year quickly comes to an end, I feel pleased with what I have accomplished vis-à-vis building community relations in such a short time. I’ve learned so much about the idiosyncrasies of Mission Hill’s people, places, and things, that I somehow feel like I am now part of the neighborhood. Above all, I am most happy seeing the college community rolling up their sleeves and learning about acute need in neighborhoods of vast adversity alongside those who need assistance most. This, to me, is the true meaning of being a civically engaged human being.

I want to remind everyone that MassArt's galleries are free and open to the public. Many of the exhibits in the galleries are works from world renowned artists so they are definitely worth your time. You can see the schedules, hours, etc. here: MassArt Galleries

I wish you all a safe and joyous holiday season filled with peace, love, and happiness.

Love,

Jeff
MACC AmeriCorps*VISTA serving at the Massachusetts College of Art and Design
Jeffrey.Robinson@massart.edu

Non-Traditional Outreach

2010-11-02T11:01:00.001-07:00

Hello from BU! I, like Aaron, must begin with an apology that I neglected my blogging duties for as obscenely long as I have, but here we are at last.

In the last two months, I have been visiting as many of Boston’s public schools as I have been able to, generally for events like back-to-school open houses and Parent Council meetings, to present the Scholarship for Parents to families who might be ready to return to school. I must express my awe and gratitude to staff and faculty at those schools, who have been so welcoming and supportive of BU’s outreach, and have provided me really positive space to have conversations with Boston families. I attended the Parent University fall kick-off over the weekend, which is a great program that BPS Office of Family & Student Engagement stages for BPS parents. The Fall Session was a series of workshops at Northeastern University designed to foster parent engagement and involvement; in addition to parents, many of the attendees were BPS staff that I have had the chance to work with this fall, and it was such a pleasure to reconnect with members of what I found to be such a warm and dedicated community. As the start-of-year push fades (September and October have been crazy-busy), Parent University was serendipitously timed to offer space to reconnect with schools that I have rapport with and can now move forward with deeper/more meaningful outreach.

I want to spend a little time discussing Parent University itself, because it is an interesting springboard to address non-traditional education. BPS’s Parent University is a series of classes taught at different district schools designed to give parents tools to take a more active roles in their children’s education, which dovetails so neatly with my goals as a *VISTA. I titled this post “Non-Traditional Outreach,” which is a joke that I use (not often to laughs, but I find it funny) to refer to my job: I do non-traditional outreach for non-traditional students. The language “non-traditional” is so revealing in that it represents that adults continuing education are so under-represented in discussions about college access and success, yet parents and parent involvement plays such a central role in college success. The reason underserved youths so often struggle with degree attainment is that they start the “college game” later, and that is often because college is not discussed at home like it will be if their parents have attended college. Programs that empower parents to talk to their children about college perform the most vital function of college success, which is augmenting the academic expectation. More immediately than pushing parents to hold their children accountable for higher education, adults who earn degrees have more confidence and earning potential, and are thus better equipped to support their families and communities. Parents are in this way the locus of change, and yet they are relegated to supporting roles in the college access discussion, and because there is no institutional expectation, the problem is creating the expectation that non-traditional students are exactly as vital to the conversation as 18-24 year olds.

Now that I have that out of the way, I can set down my pom-poms and think strategically about how to institutionalize this fairly new scholarship within the community itself. I am the third *VISTA at BU to work on Scholarship for Parents, and I am so fortunate to have followed behind two *VISTAs who worked so hard to make the Scholarship visible in the community and create institutional memory within the Metropolitan College. What I see as my challenge is to develop the content of my outreach, and to strengthen MET’s relationship to the community. In the end, this comes down to the relationships we have with community members, and how we foster mutual accountability. Legitimacy emerges as we realize the stake we have in each other, how the community fabric is dependent on that mutualism. Where the word “non-traditional” comes in is the nature of this relationship we have with Boston adults, which until two years ago did not legitimately exist. There have been no institutional avenues to compel working adults who are just trying to keep the wheels on the family wagon that college is prerequisite to family and community health. Now that I have developed a lay of the land, my job is to foster strong ties in the community and institutionalize the college standard.

Until next time,

Aaron Villere
MACC AmeriCorps*VISTA
Boston University Metropolitan College

More than my imagination

2010-10-06T12:18:00.000-07:00

I suppose I’ll start this blog out with an apology, I kind of got busy, uninterested and decided that blogging in September would not happen. September was pretty wild. I spent a number of days loathing over tasks and repetitively reconsidering the realities of my program, Serving Our Communities. In all of my mental searching, I still found no real explanation that provided me with the key to unlocking my basic question, “how is this building capacity, and how will it manage without me?”

During our *VISTA/Supervisor gathering at Amherst College, my supervisor Meghan, and I were able to finally make a long overdue connection. At the beginning of my post, she had several obligations, so I went two and a half weeks without her. Within that time, I had already created a few connections and had formed my own opinion of BHCC and of some of the people within it. Meghan is the face of the Community Engagement Office, it is here from her creation and she birthed it three years ago. What I have concluded in regards to this office is a lack of structure, a lack of connections/partnerships, and a true misunderstanding of what this office is and does. So during the *VISTA/supervisor meeting, Meghan revealed a number of her barriers and ideas, and how these items have affected the progress of the office. Although I see the potential in Serving Our Communities, I would much rather focus on planning, foundation building and organizing the office, so that it is able to productively provide its services and resources as naturally as possible for students, faculty, staff and community partners.

I imagined that this conversation would move us to the next stage of planning, but it simply cracked the door, as I don’t feel that a significant move towards sharing responsibility was made. As a result, I have decided that I must begin to self initiate, make changes when I see that they are necessary, do a little cleaning up around the edges, noticed or not. As for Serving Our Communities, I have a jolly group of students, all of them spread pretty far across the Boston and North of Boston area… we’ll see how it works out. For now, I plan to develop two stylistic forms of the program. One will be for a curriculum based course, the other for a student run organization. In these fashions, SOC will likely work best. I have a lot more that I must update the world on, but for now, I’ll organize my thoughts and share them another time. To all the world there is a responsibility and that is to leave this place better than you encountered it. Thanks for tuning in.

A@ron C

THE TOUGH STUFF ON COMMUNITY RESEARCH: Exploring MassArt's Relationship to Mission Hill

2010-09-06T11:19:00.000-07:00

I recently ventured out into Mission Hill to clinch a better lay of the land in preparation for the asset-based community research I will conduct to explore how MassArt students, faculty, and staff make a difference in their closest neighborhoods. I was walking down Tremont Street near the Mission Church, sporting my MassArt t-shirt, when a local resident stopped me clear in my tracks and made a vivid comment that will change the entire course of my research for the entire year.

“That school destroyed my neighborhood,” he voiced.

I came to an arrant halt over this statement because his outcry brought the issue of stewardship of place right to my feet. After he left, I stood on the sidewalk and simply reflected on MassArt’s perception among locals and how the community *really* thinks about the college.

Colleges and universities across America work tirelessly to assess the neighborhoods they live/work within, and, more than ever, spearhead civic engagement and service-based learning initiatives to help university and community live in accord. But a grandiose paradox cannot be overlooked; while providing educational opportunities and public services for a community, institutions often times forget that massive expansion of its urban campuses gravely upsets its closest neighbors. Another, what seems to be a non-heeded concern, is the vast growth of student populations void of adequate dorm space to house them. This debauchery forces students to seek off-campus housing in Section 8 dominated neighborhoods, which yields escalated rents for everyone, even the locals. And let us not even mention the trash and disrespect produced by America’s best and brightest students. I am not speaking of these issues to be negative, but this realm is the tough stuff on community research that we all succumb to, and more specifically, I will need to cull as part of my neighborhood analysis efforts.

My experience with that local gentleman oriented a host of new questions that MassArt wants answered. In addition to providing meaning for the college’s role in Mission Hill, now campus leaders want to know how does the community perceive the college, and how can the campus community make strides for better relationships and partnerships. The task seems daunting, albeit imperative to understanding how MassArt’s public art programs, civic engagement, and service-based curricula cut against the grain of civic and social responsibility.

MassArt, while naturally flawed at times, truly takes its role in Mission Hill seriously; that’s why I am here – to research and analyze the level of HOW serious the nation’s first art school collaborates. New Student Orientation begins tomorrow and 400-plus students will pile into various parts of Mission Hill and lower Roxbury to explore the neighborhoods that MassArt hopes will provide a collaborative and healthy synergy between locals and artists. Moreover, the Center for Art and Community Partnerships has an impressive amount of public art programs and partnerships ready to go for the fall semester.

In addition to New Student Orientation duties, I began meeting with MassArt leaders to lay the groundwork for my research efforts. By the end of September I will be on the streets interviewing community leaders, distributing asset surveys, and engaging MassArt (and local high school) students to help analyze the data. The research may yield partnerships and collaborations not strongly cultivated by MassArt, and so I welcome and otherwise encourage the art community to help decide exactly how the campus community can further nurture these local organizations. I am also thinking broadly about how my research will be published and disseminated.

One last thing: Many people asked about the galleries at MassArt; yes, most exhibits in our galleries are free and open to the public (with exception to opening nights). More information can be found here: http://www.massart.edu/Galleries.html.

Until next time, continue to inspire without boundaries and make a difference in the communities you live!

Peace, love, and happiness to everyone,

Jeff~
MACC AmeriCorps*VISTA serving Massachusetts College of Art and Design
Jeffrey.Robinson@massart.edu

Adaptation

2010-08-31T07:51:00.000-07:00

In the first few weeks of settling in at Bunker Hill Community College, I thought for sure that a mistake had been made. Generally, my over-optimistic, cheerful attitude and perspective are appreciated and in addition to that, I often find others that share the same excitement and energy. Here, it just seemed… different. I spent all summer thinking of ideas, strategies and resources to make the work plan that I envisioned, successful and inspiring. I had ideas to really engage students and faculty members into the works of community organizing. I wanted to provide an opportunity for students at Community Colleges to really take on the meaning of “community” and come together with members of their neighborhoods to challenge social issues and stigmas. But, my optimism has been slightly doused. There are politics within the seams of every institution. There are barriers, the do’s and don’ts, and all of them have a way of sapping your vision of its color… Turning it from bright blues and yellows to dark browns and grays… With that, comes the real challenge, and in this case it’s the ability to adapt.

“The art of life is a constant readjustment to our surroundings” Kakuzo Okakauro. Adapting and transitioning to this foreign environment has in fact, been the challenge of my first month as an AmeriCorps*VISTA at Bunker Hill Community College. In North Carolina, I had created a haven, a place of safety. Here in Boston, I’m new and I’m learning more about the area and more about myself. What has been extremely helpful during this month of orientation to my new life in Boston is the support I’ve received from my fellow VISTAs. I have never met such a wonderful group of encouraging and intelligent people, all of whom are willing to lend a listening ear and advice whenever I need it. With their support, I feel I now have more pieces to the puzzle of my work plan configured. In the next month, I’ll be implementing the structure for Serving Our Communities, a six week “Common Interest Community" that includes, orientation to, exploration of, and service to one of the many cities of Boston. This program is in its pilot stage, and has a lot of barriers and possibly unrealistic expectations. Having no real example to lead by, I’ve struggled to create the structure of such a tedious program in a place as transitory as a Community College. I’ve been given great ideas from other VISTAs and I’m equally anxious and excited about putting them to use.

I’ll be blogging about this challenge and my adjustment to life outside of North Carolina… I hope you’ll stick around to see what a year of internal and external growth brings to fruition for this Bunker Hill Community College VISTA!

Warmly,

A@ron

UMASS Boston on the road to engaging their students in the community

2010-08-24T09:28:00.001-07:00

It has yet to be a full month since I started my placement at UMASS Boston. However, I can say that it has been one of the most interesting experiences of my life. I have been blessed with a very welcoming group of individuals to make sure I get acclimated to the campus.

I have been working in the Office of Student Leadership and Community Engagement at UMASS Boston. This department thrives off of working to every individual's strengths, rather than focus on improving the weaknesses. This view fuels greater productivity amongst a team. The few students that I have met thus far have an enormous amount of passion and creativity towards their missions and I think that the motto of this office has contributed a great deal towards their enthusiasm.

This year I will be working greatly with the students of UMASS. The ultimate goal is to get the students more engaged in working with the community. The students would be volunteering and creating programs for the benefit of creating a more unified community where they feel connected to the individuals and families they live with.

Currently, I am planning a Volunteer Fair to make the students aware of the various opportunities there are to get involved in the community. I hope to have a large variety of community based organizations attending it in order to gain the interests of the diverse population of students.

From what I have seen, the VISTAs before myself contributed a great deal towards this goal. I have some big shoes to fill and I look forward to working with the students and the community organizations this year as well as building on and improving all of our strengths.

Please feel free to contact me. My email is debra.harris@umb.edu.

One love,
Debra Harris-MACC Americorps*VISTA at UMASS Boston

Boston University Metropolitan College: Extending College Access to Non-Traditional Students

2010-08-19T08:14:00.000-07:00

When we talk about education (especially post-secondary education), we tend to focus on acquisition and development of vocational skills; for instance, when I tell people I hold a literature degree, the consensus follow-up is, “What are you going to do with that, teach?” While it is important to think of an education as preparing the student for a career track, some of the most essential benefits of completing a college degree become peripheral to simply getting a job.

I am spending my AmeriCorps*VISTA year recruiting for the Scholarship for Parents at Boston University’s Metropolitan College; the Scholarship is a 50% tuition discount for parents of Boston & Chelsea Public School students to complete a Bachelor’s degree. I will be spending much of my time this year, as I am today, at community events meeting parents and community outreach coordinators to discuss the opportunity and eventually enroll non-traditional students at BU.

The reason this Scholarship exists, besides of course developing job skills and opening career opportunities to first-generation college students, is one of those peripheral benefits of higher education: connecting the campus community to the residential community. Unfortunately, college campuses can sometimes become insulated from the neighborhoods that surround them. Traditional college students often transplant or commute, and they naturally spend much of their time with only other students. When students graduate, they move away, and a new batch of students moves in. Likewise, in lower-income neighborhoods, nativity is very high, and residents do not always have opportunities to interact with people from very different backgrounds. The distance between the college campus and the permanent residential community, while only a few blocks, can seem like miles.

By reaching out into Boston and Chelsea neighborhoods like Roxbury, Dorchester, Mattapan, and Hyde Park (for example) and pulling them into the campus experience, we catalyze an otherwise unlikely but immeasurably enriching relationship. Our Parent Scholars go to class and study with an incredibly diverse community contained on the BU campus. Conversely, out-of-state students learn about the challenges facing Boston residents and people who attend school while working full-time. Experience breeds confidence and understanding, and the product of the BU Experience is not only academic achievement but also civic engagement and community-building.

This year, I will be experiencing this first hand, as I will of course be voraciously engaging community members, but also taking classes at the Metropolitan College. I am very fortunate to be living this experience as I advocate for it, and look forward to its many lessons both in and out of the classroom.

Like Jeff, I will also be documenting my projects, successes and challenges, and thoughts of general interest here periodically. Also feel free to contact me at avillere@bu.edu.

One love!

Aaron Villere

MACC AmeriCorps*VISTA

Boston University Metropolitan College

Helping Build Community at MassArt…One Paintbrush at a Time!

2010-08-11T08:43:00.003-07:00

Beloved community activist Bob Moses once asked a family living in the Mississippi Delta during the tumultuous Civil Rights era,

“How do you build and organize a community?” He answered, “By throwing a ball into your neighbor’s yard; that way you have to cross the fence and engage in a dialogue with them. And then your neighbor throws the ball into their neighbor’s yard.”

I took Bob’s spirit to heart when I showed up at the Massachusetts College of Art and Design (MassArt) for day one of my AmeriCorps*VISTA service with the Massachusetts Campus Compact (MACC). As my supervisor and I walked around the bohemian campus I could only imagine the creativity and ingenuity behind how MassArt builds partnerships and community.

My thoughts became more defined later that day when I met a cohort of MassArt and Harvard students (working with the Phillips Brooks House Association) running a summer art camp for a throng of underprivileged Mission Hill kids. I stood back and witnessed three worlds ally in perfect accord: Harvard, arguably the poster child of wealth and prestige; MassArt, the artistic capital of Massachusetts; and, kiddos from one of Boston’s most high risk neighborhoods. Sure, the kids concentrated their attention on the fun painting and printmaking activities (much of which ended up all over my clothes), but much more happened that day. Everyone learned a lesson on what it means to be part of community and a neighborhood; whether as a public or private institution providing services to a certain demographic or as a low-income family tapping the neighborhood’s resources. That experience properly oriented me to the notion that MassArt is not just an art school. The institution cultivates strong relationships with its Mission Hill and Roxbury neighbors, and to Bob Moses’s delight, the university community is constantly throwing balls (or maybe paintbrushes) to learn more about them and their needs.

So…what fun things will I be doing in my year of service? The Center for Art and Community Partnerships (CACP), the department wherein I work, needs me to research the impact MassArt’s public art initiatives (colloquially known as the Neighborhood ArtZones) have on the communities it serves. In other words, MassArt wants an official university publication illustrating the difference it is making in Mission Hill and lower Roxbury. The CACP also wants me to explore further community partnership opportunities and hone in more closely on the needs (affordable housing, educational opportunities, etc.) of the neighborhood and how MassArt can address those needs by facilitating public art programs. All that said, the President of MassArt, Kay Sloan, gave me her blessing and sent me to my 12^th floor office to begin this important work and make a difference in the world.

I will also work on other public art programs and student initiatives. Last summer, the CACP invited the Combat Paper Project, a program where returned veterans turn their uniforms into paper and participants make art projects on the paper, to come and work with the community. We want the Vermont based organization to come next summer, so I plan to assist in the logistics and writing the grant to make that a reality. In the coming weeks I will also play an important role in the New Student Orientation. I am assisting with a “creative mapping” activity with 400 plus students, which will orient them to the community and reasons why MassArt works so closely with its neighbors.

When I finished graduate school at the University of Massachusetts I never thought I would embark on this journey. In fact, I thought I was bound for a doctoral program in American History, but I needed to make my education practical and useful for humanity, which is why I applied for this MACC AmeriCorps*VISTA position. I think it is everyone’s civic duty to vote and do some small feat to make a difference in the world, whether that means serving your country or your community, those of us privileged with education (and housing for that matter) should disseminate our skills to those who do not have fair or adequate access to basic necessities. So here I am! I plan to write bi-monthly on the projects I am working on and discuss ways that others can be involved. Please stop back often because the other bloggers have pretty awesome posts too. And if you’re ever in the Longwood Medical Area of Boston make sure to visit MassArt and come say hello.

Feel free to contact me at Jeffrey.Robinson@massart.edu.

In Peace and love,

Jeff Robinson
MACC AmeriCorps*VISTA serving at MassArt

Updates from William Dowd at North Shore Community College

2010-05-12T10:21:00.000-07:00

Yesterday wrapped up our Haiti relief efforts here at the North Shore Community College. I must admit the planning stages were a bit tedious; our committee had been meeting since January, all went swell at last night’s benefit though, as MC of the night, and it having been my first time ever, I was totally nervous. We pulled it off by raising over 3,100 dollars for Partners in Health.

The evening was slated with back to back performances by local Lynn performers with cool names like Lois Lane and the Daily Planets, Historic Hysteria, Sadi, a poet, that goes by the name of “Big Brother,” Lynn’s St. Mary’s Choir, and guitarist/singer Julio.

Our keynote for the evening, Dr. Annekathryn “AK” Goodman, an Associate Professor at Harvard Medical School and member of the International Surgical Response Team, elegantly and gently read from a piece she wrote of her time in Haiti. Dr. Goodman was one of the first responders. Such a selfless and kind person, wish you could have heard her. I told her she had a perfect radio voice. She laughed.

During our planning stages the committee worried that too many benefits were happening simultaneously, deciding to hold off until April, but with that we considered media repercussions. As with most catastrophes, media outlets tend to cover them unfailingly until the next big story. Until big stories like Lady GaGa’s new outfit, Tigers new mistress, Sandra Bullock getting a divorce, which certainly takes precedent in headlines over the current state of Haiti or international efforts. It’s quite sickening. Our challenge was getting people to still actively pursue helping Haiti despite the dip in media attention.

2010-03-16T11:46:00.001-07:00

It’s been a while since my last blog post, and I think that’s reflective of how busy I’ve been in the past couple of months. In working to build a Civic Engagement Center at Salem State, I spent much of my fall semester hearing the needs of local community-based organizations, and am now starting to help make the connections between those organizations and the people at Salem State who might best be able to work with those identified collaboration opportunities. The hope is not one-time opportunities, but rather long term relationships between the institution and the community.

The other half of my role is to support student civic engagement efforts, which has been anything from planning a volunteer fair, to helping plan a Habitat for Humanity Alternative Spring Break to southern Georgia, to encouraging students to give urgently needed blood to Red Cross. Obviously Haitian relief efforts have been a focus of service efforts across the country over the past month, and Salem State is no exception. With over 150 students who identify as Haitian or Haitian American, the crisis has significantly impacted many on campus. Several student organizations have sponsored fund raisers which have raised over $5,000 for the Red Cross and other relief agencies. It has been incredible to see the outpouring of support on campus during this time of need.

- Jay Helmer

2010-03-16T11:44:00.000-07:00

I attended one of my favorite events for this MACC AmeriCorps*VISTA year. I held an information table at the Dorchester FAMILY School Initiative (DFSI) Community Night. If you don’t know, DFSI is a partnership connecting three Boston public elementary schools (Holmes, Lee, and Fifield) to health and social service organizations (SCI and Dotwell among others).

I first learned about DFSI at an event run by the Office of Family and Student Engagement at Boston Public Schools. There I met the Family and Community Outreach Coordinator at Holmes, who connected me to staff at Lee and Fifield. In the fall, I had the privilege to meet parents and lead presentations about the Scholarship for Parents at parent council meetings, open houses, and other special nights for these schools.

At quite a few events, I kept running into the DFSI Community Liaison/AmeriCorps Member, who invited me to this community night. It was held at Lee Elementary and included families from all three schools in the initiative. There was dinner, raffles, performances by the students, and a speech from Mayor Menino! The purpose of the DFSI Community Night was not only to have fun but also to connect families to organizations in Boston. MATCH Charter, Boston After School and Beyond, and TechBoston were among the numerous organizations sharing resources with families.

I knew the event would be big, but it was much larger than I had anticipated. Even Mayor Menino mentioned how he was pleasantly surprised with the high turnout for the community night in his speech.

Thinking back about the night, I can’t be too surprised with the turnout. It’s just a testament to how effective partnerships like DFSI can be when community organizations and schools proactively collaborate to engage families.

If you couldn’t tell, I’m a fan of the initiative. To learn more about DFSI, check out http://www.mydorchester.org/DFSI.

Peace,

Lindsay

2010-02-16T08:20:00.000-08:00

It’s been quite a while since I last wrote, but it’s not for a lack of things to say. Wrapping up the Fall semester and then preparing for the Spring semester kept me very busy! As I discussed the areas of greatest need with community partners, talked to professors about the setup of their Community Based Learning courses, and helped students to choose the appropriate community projects for the semester, I couldn’t help looking back to August and September, when I first started as a VISTA at Holy Cross. I was performing the same tasks in September as I did in January, yet the process seemed entirely different the second time around. It was a great feeling to understand my responsibilities and even suggest measures for improvement, especially when I remembered feeling lost and confused during my first month as a VISTA. It’s truly remarkable how much you can learn in a mere few months.

At the end of January, our office hosted a visit from Peachy Myers, White House Liaison to the Corporation for National and Community Service and a former MACC VISTA. In an address to students, Ms. Myers shared her remarkable story, beginning with her service as a VISTA at UMass Boston, and ending with a job at the White House—and she’s only 32 years old! In ten years after graduating from Vanderbilt, Ms. Myers advocated for the homeless in San Francisco, aided Hurricane Katrina victims in Austin, played a key organizing role in Obama’s campaign, and started working toward a Master’s degree—though opportunities to serve all over the United States have delayed her from completing her degree so far. In a roundtable discussion, Ms. Myers urged students to give up on the idea of a five or ten year plan, and instead to consider life after graduation one year at a time. If she had set her mind to completing a degree or working in a specific field immediately after graduating, Ms. Myers would have missed out on the amazing opportunities she’s squeezed into a short ten year timeframe. A very recent graduate myself, I was inspired and relieved to hear about Peachy’s many successes and the roundabout path that has led her to each of them.

Yesterday, I was able to visit Kate Rafey, the VISTA at Stonehill College, whose work is very similar to my own. MACC encourages VISTAs to visit one another and trade ideas, but this was the first time I’ve taken advantage of such an opportunity. While Kate’s office has a very similar set up to my own, she’s taken different approaches to many of the same issues that I’ve come across (transportation, for instance, which seems to plague most service learning and community service offices). Chatting with Kate about the structure of her office, her process for placing students at community sites, and even the CBL courses that Stonehill offers has given me new ideas that I’d like to implement at Holy Cross. It seems that every college or university has an entirely different structure of offices, especially when it comes to community engagement, and I find it fascinating to discover where VISTAs sit at their institutions and what role they play in community engagement. It’s hard to believe that half of my VISTA term is over, but I’ll definitely take advantage of more VISTA visits over the next six months.

2010-01-29T13:03:00.001-08:00

Recently, I sat down with Ms. Cate Kaluzny, Coordinator of Service-Learning, at North Shore Community College to write a story on NSCC service-learning. Ms. Kaluzny and I met early in my year of service and found ourselves coming to the conclusion that people often confuse service- learning with community service. We decided that a story would be a good idea to combat ignorance.

The story I wrote below will run in the NSCC student newspaper, The Pennon, in February 2010. After being approached by Ms. Dana Lyford, ex-contributor for this Blog and now my MACC *VISTA Leader about blogging for the month of December or January, I thought that this story would be relevant to the blogs purpose. It gives a good idea of what service-learning is, the importance of reciprocity and reflection; furthermore, the intrinsic and tangible benefits one attains when taking service-learning courses, which Ms. Kaluzny so elegantly and thoroughly explains. Okay, lastly the latter part of this story is relevant to most schools with a service-learning component. Enjoy!

NSCC’s service-learning program is going into its ninth year. The program started with a just handful of faculty members, has now grown quite a bit; with 50 faculty members on board and 400 students participating in service-learning activities in their communities every semester.

If student service-learning participation at NSCC were added up, the tally would be well over 20,000 hours of service. Last academic year alone students completed 5,000 hours of service.

With all that written, you may be asking: “Okay, what is service-learning?”

Service-Learning, for many, has been an experimental form of teaching and learning, because these classes are not taught entirely in the traditional sense. There are parts of the course where students are learning in their communities. Not within the walls of the classroom

The service being performed always has relevance to the course. Students are assessed or graded, through reflection, with a follow up paper on their experiences with service, but not always.

According to Cate Kaluzny, NSCC service-learning coordinator, “Students can reflect by creating artwork, participating in discussion groups, and using online methods.” Reflection is absolutely essential to service-learning. These courses give students a deeper understanding of the course their taking and its subject matter.

Take for instance, Professor Linda Bassett’s American Cuisine course provides, an excellent example of service-learning, nine of her culinary students volunteered at Inn Between/Inn Transition to prepare frozen meals for the community based organization’s 40 residents.

The staff at Between/Inn Transition were grateful for students’ help; likewise students were able to expand their knowledge of cooking American Cuisine.

Another example, Professor Kathy Yanchus’ Reading Two course travelled to Stewart School in Topsfield, Mass., last semester to read stories in front of 2^nd graders.

NSCC students engaged children in discussion and lead activities related to topics on the books they’d read. Students performed a great community service, while at the same time enhancing their reading skills.

Service-Learning not only compliments the classroom, but transcends it, offering students benefits outside of their academics. At the beginning of each semester Kaluzny visits classes to communicate potential benefits.

Such benefits from service include: building social capital, becoming civically engaged citizens, active-real life experience. Maybe even help a student find their passion in life.

“It doesn’t happen all the time, but sometimes students find their passion in working with a specific population or a specific setting,” said Kaluzny.

One thing is certain, volunteer work can definitely give direction to those uncertain as to what career path they want to take; moreover, service-learning helps narrow down choices.

It’s not a guarantee students will always find their passion when doing service, but it will definitely give them life experience and direction.

During Kaluzny’s classroom visits she encourages students to place volunteer and service-learning on resumes/transfer applications.

“This tells potential employers or admission people at a four year school that you have work experience, but it all tells them something about your character, that you are willing to give of your time, your skills, and your heart to help others,” says Kaluzny, further noting, volunteering gives job experience, such experience as: people, time management, and organizational skills.

With as many faculty members placing a service-learning component in their course these days, there’s a good chance most students will end up in one of those classes during their time on campus.

“When you do, I encourage you to embrace the opportunity and learn from it,” said Kaluzny.

Happy Holidays!

2009-12-18T07:52:00.000-08:00

The past two weeks have finally got me into the holiday spirit.

Last week I sifted through holiday cards at Barnes & Noble for half an hour. I didn’t want to be picky, but I’m not someone who just grabs the first box of cards in sight. Plus it was hard to find a card with a pretty design and thoughtful message. After finally deciding on a set of cards, I dedicated a day and a half to writing personal cards to community supporters.

These supporters have been championing BU’s Scholarship for Parents anywhere from a few months to more than a year, and I owe them a huge THANK YOU. Although recruitment events can make life hectic, they have been rewarding. With these cards, I wanted to acknowledge people who’ve made the first half of my service year eventful. That’s why I didn’t mind writing messages to every supporter till my hand felt like it would fall off.

This is my last week of work for 2010, and there has been no shortage of bonding time with coworkers. The holiday party for my college was Tuesday, the holiday party for my office was Wednesday, and the holiday party for my university was Thursday. It reminded me of what I like about this work environment.

People at my university work hard but make time for relaxation. Many employees balance school with work, and that is no easy feat. I couldn’t complain about balancing one class with work because some employees balance two to three classes with work … and they manage their responsibilities well.

Our Parent Scholar JoAn Blake (pronounced “Joanne,” not “Joan”) does an excellent job at managing her time. This semester, she worked, took a few classes, spoke at outreach events for the Scholarship for Parents, AND of course manages parental responsibilities. She continually amazes people that meet her, and I also owe her a big THANK YOU for taking time to share her BU experience with the community.

I hope you all have a safe and happy holiday season!

Peace,

Lindsay

Stonehill College Comes to Boston University

2009-12-15T09:59:00.001-08:00

I’m not going to talk about my program today. Part of what makes MACC enriching is the potential to collaborate with other AmeriCorps*VISTAs. If I cannot directly meet the needs of campus or community members through my program, I can tap into other resources in the MACC and/or BU networks.

Recently, I connected graduate students from BU’s School of Education (SED) to Kate Rafey, MACC AmeriCorps*VISTA at Stonehill College. It happened a few weeks ago when I received an email from an SED graduate student. She read my blog and asked me to speak about service learning as part of her group’s class presentation. Since my service is to coordinate a scholarship program rather than service learning, I asked other VISTAs who work with service learning if they could present for SED. Luckily, Kate volunteered for this opportunity.

Today I sat in on the class and listened to the hour-long class presentation. The students presented theories and research related to service learning. They touched on concepts by Eyler and Giles, which is a coincidence because Giles actually led a service-learning workshop at Campus Compact’s pre-service orientation back in July.

Kate spoke about her personal experience as Coordinator of Stonehill’s Office of Community-Based Learning (CBL). Not only did she illustrate the college’s commitment to social justice, she also explained how her work relates to MACC, AmeriCorps, and CNCS (Corporation for National and Community Service).

If you want to learn more about the work Kate is getting done, check out these resources!

CBL Site: http://www.stonehill.edu/x18172.xml

CBL Blog: http://communitybasedlearning.wordpress.com/

CBL on Twitter: http://twitter.com/stonehillCBL

I’m following Stonehill CBL on Twitter and you should too! If you don’t have an account, get one!

Happy Holidays!

Lindsay

Happy Thanksgiving from North Shore Community College

2009-12-03T06:41:00.001-08:00

It’s the day after Thanksgiving – I was thinking, which is always good, about how Thanksgiving Dinner shouldn’t be called Thanksgiving Dinner. I’ve got a problem with the word “Dinner.” Thanksgiving only comes around once a year and we call it a dinner? Dinner just doesn’t do justice to the hallowed day of eating – a day to stuff your face and eat mashed potato’s with your fingers (as my niece probably did) celebration, she loves the SO BIG GAME; we use this to manipulate her into letting us wash her hands!

Thanksgiving’s like a small festival, especially if you’ve got a huge family as I do, but this year wasn’t as large as we’ve had in past years - we had anywhere between 8 and upwards of 20-25 people at our house. Over the past year family members have moved to Italy, spent it with boyfriends or girlfriends, or simply just wanted to keep it quiet. I hope that you had a wonderful holiday.

The times at North Shore Community College are changing. We only have two weeks left for this half of the academic year. I’ve definitely been hearing whispers of finals week. Today, as a matter of fact, the schedules for the fall final dates have been made available. This year is flying.

Putting the holiday aside and getting back in to the groove of things wasn’t too hard, the vacation was delightful and refreshing. I’ve been quite the busy bee, as we approach the next semester, my interface with students will go up.

I have two big projects underway: community service fair and a leadership series. The fair will occur at the Lynn Gym in February. The leadership series will be a variety of panel discussions, workshops, and finally guest speakers.

Student Leaders will follow a track for the series. We will offer three concentrations for student to follow, the concentration will be decided by the student, where they feel improvement is need :

Communication Skills Track

Programming Skills Track

Personal Track

Each track will require students to follow guidelines, depending on what track they take will determine which workshops they will attend. After they meet all the requirements of their track they will be rewarded with a certificate.

The planning aspect of this series will be “daunting Will” as my co-worker Victoria, Assistant Director of Student Life , says, but I say why not do something of this nature. Victoria thought of the having it set up as a track program. I thought the idea was brilliant, next thing you know it, Diana Kerry, Director of the Public Policy Institute, is now on board for helping in the efforts.

It’s a great time to be at North Shore Community College! I can’t wait to give students the chance to improve their leadership as well as connecting them with the community. Early Service Training is coming up next week. A time for us to reflect on this past semester’s progress and receive more training. It’s going to be a fun time.

Peace Out!

Will

AmeriCorps Opening Day

2009-11-12T08:33:00.000-08:00

I attended Massachusetts AmeriCorps Opening Day this weekend! Since MACC VISTAs are mostly at different schools, we rarely see all of each other in one setting. Opening day was this past Friday at the Reggie Lewis Track & Athletic Center at Roxbury Community College. MACC was among more than 100 other AmeriCorps programs in the state.

The highlight of the day for me was listening to a spoken word piece from the Youth Empowerment Corps at Untied Teen Equality Center (UTEC). A group of people from this organization read a piece written by a teenager in the program. I believe they said she was 16. I would paraphrase a few lines from it, but that could not do her writing justice. In a nutshell, it was a thought-provoking view of our society, the state of our economy, and the nature of our culture … and how she wants it to be transformed.

Also I enjoyed the performance by Essencia Dancing from Youth Start AmeriCorps Program Roca Inc. I liked how they incorporated dance routines from different genres like bachata and hip hop. I have eclectic taste in music so the performance definitely had my stamp of approval.

I liked how this opening day allowed members from some AmeriCorps programs to showcase their work.

Overall it was just a nice break to catch up with other VISTAs. I did not realize how much I had done in three months till I spoke to other VISTAs in MACC and other programs.

For the Scholarship for Parents, I have conducted information sessions at the Allston-Brighton Resource Center, the Williams School in Chelsea, and ABCD Hyde Park Head Start among other organizations. I have attended community events such as New Bostonians Community Day near Government Center, BPS Showcase for Schools, and BPS Parent University’s Kickoff. I have also gone to individual school events such as Trotter Elementary School’s coffee hour, Lee Elementary School’s parent council meeting, and Guild Elementary School’s open house.

This sounds like a dizzying list of schools and organizations, but that goes to show you how extensive this outreach has been. Whether I have traveled to Chelsea, Dorchester, Roxbury, East Boston, Hyde Park, or Brighton, there are parents with a strong desire to attain a college degree.

Whether they plan to apply for school this spring, next fall, or in a few years from now, it has been amazing to hear their stories and determination to fit college into their schedule either part-time or full-time. Some of them need or want to take more ESL courses or college-level courses before committing to a bachelor’s degree program, but at least they are starting to develop plans for themselves. For some, that is a huge step in itself.

- Lindsay

Greetings from Salem!

2009-11-05T09:27:00.000-08:00

As I write this, I realize that it’s November and almost three months into my VISTA term, which is scary because in many ways the time has flown, at the same time there’s been a lot packed in to those three months! In October, my focus was split between outreach meetings with about a dozen community-based organizations to hear about their needs on behalf of the College and look at ways they might be able to build a mutually beneficial partnership with the college. It’s really interesting to hear about the challenges of non-profits during these difficult economic times. The meetings have also reinforced the challenge of our work: that often the type of short-term service or engagement that a college or university is most able to do is not helpful and sometimes even detrimental to those community organizations. My challenge at Salem State has been to try infuse service into the culture of a busy commuter student-dominated institution.

One of my major projects this past month has been to coordinate a large-scale food drive to benefit the six the largest food banks on the North Shore. I met with one of them a week before starting the drive and they mentioned how the organization had received a 25 percent increase in demand for food in the past year. With that dire need in mind, I tried to promote the drive using the “under-a-rock” method—that is unless you have been living under a rock then you should know about the food drive. Despite these efforts, and additional incentives offered to student organizations by the Student Government Association we had only received a moderate number of donations leading up to the deadline, and then on the final day…the flood gates opened. One student organization brought in six large boxes of food and several others made significant contributions. The drive ended very successfully and proved that the old maxim proves true on a college campus, if it weren’t for the last minute nothing would get done.

The craziness that is October in Salem culminated on Halloween when 100,000 visitors descended on the city (population 40,000.) A few VISTAs from Boston came out to experience the revelry with me, in what was easily the best Halloween I’ve had since undergrad.

Later,

Jay H

Meet MACC AmeriCorps*VISTA Lauren Buckley!

2009-10-07T08:51:00.000-07:00

I can’t believe it’s already October, and I’m just writing my first entry! To be fair, I started a little later than everyone else, but I’ve still been working for about six weeks now, so that’s not much of an excuse. As you might be able to guess, my work at Holy Cross is off to a very busy start. During the first two weeks, my term of service overlapped with that of the outgoing MACC AmeriCorps*VISTA, Sarah Shugrue, so I was able to benefit from her experience and wisdom for a short time. Sarah was amazingly helpful, answering my questions about the position all summer and imparting the knowledge she’s gained on the job during the two weeks when I worked with her.

Sarah’s departure coincided with the first week of the semester—probably by design—so the pace really picked up just as I was beginning to navigate the position on my own. Luckily, I am one of many *VISTAs this year to serve at my alma mater, so the setting and many of the faces that I saw on campus were familiar. Many people ask me whether it’s strange to be working at a school that I graduated from mere months ago, and part of me feared that it would be. Some have even remarked that I’m taking a “fifth year” at Holy Cross, presumably to elude the pressures of the real world for another twelve months, but I’ve tried to be clear that I don’t see it that way myself. I’m not living on campus—in fact, I’m commuting an hour to and from work each day—and I have the opportunity now to see Holy Cross from an entirely different perspective than I did as a student. Although I have the privilege of working with college students and taking in the ivy-covered buildings and fall foliage on my way to the office every morning, the days when I could roll out of bed five minutes before class, spend my entire day focused solely on my own intellectual and personal development, and while away evenings sharing a bottle of wine with my closest friends have sadly passed. While I work on a college campus, I’ve had to conform to the rigors of a regular schedule and professional dress just like my former classmates, and I don’t feel that I’ve cheated myself of the opportunity to experience something new.

One factor that prevents me from feeling that I’m stretching out my college career is that I’m working in an office that I never utilized as a student. I am working in the Community Based Learning office, and regrettably, I never took a CBL course at Holy Cross. I wish that I had taken advantage of this opportunity as a student, but I think that my distance from the department helps me to bring a new perspective to the office, while also helping me not to fall into an awkward position somewhere between student and staff member. I’ve been told that I have a young face, and I am fully aware that most of the people who see me on campus assume that I am a current student, but being introduced to faculty and students as a staff member has helped to establish my position appropriately and accurately on campus. Going from student to staff member is doubtlessly a difficult transition, and things like calling professors by their first names and leading a student group have been challenging to say the least; yet I am beginning to develop a level of professionalism and confidence that I never needed as a student, and I’m learning to, as my supervisor says, “put on my big girl voice” to ensure that I am being heard and taken seriously on campus.

I’m trying to cram weeks of reflection into a single entry, so there’s so much more to say, but I’ll wrap up for now. Hopefully it won’t be another six weeks before I sit down to write another entry, so I’ll have plenty of opportunities to share all that has been going through my mind. I want to emphasize, finally, that choosing to serve for a year with MACC AmeriCorps*VISTA was absolutely the right decision for me. I can’t deny that the lack of paying jobs available to recent graduates influenced my choice ever so slightly, but after a month and a half I can already tell how formative this year is going to be in determining the person I will become and the life I will lead from here on out. MACC AmeriCorps*VISTA offers a unique opportunity for young adults to gain work experience, training, and guidance that my friends who have “real jobs” just aren’t getting, and I would highly recommend this path to anyone who is considering it.

2009-10-07T08:23:00.000-07:00

How interesting, I wrote my last entry on a Friday afternoon and this one is as well. My anticipation of fall is growing. I’m ready for wet rainy days (Alfie may be a little unhappy about this), the smell of Earth, and decaying leaves. Fall should be depressing, right? For me though it isn’t. Take instance the other day I found myself rejoicing over my first “chill moment”. You know the first gust that creates a chilly feeling going straight up your back or causes those microscopic hairs on your arms to stiff up. After this you know the onslaught of fall has arrived. Fall creates an awe effect with its brilliant colors. Massachusetts is a perfect state to be in for that mushy wooshy stuff. Think about it New England foliage I’ve never experienced it, and I’m falling leaf over leaf for it because of what I’ve heard. I can’t wait to jump in leaves, watch puppies jump in leaves, feel the warmth of bonfires, drink apple cider, press the different colored leaves with an iron, and eat pumpkin pie. Halloween oh how could I forget. I’ve picked out my costume already: the wolf costume Max wears in Where The Wild Things Are. I got the idea from the book and it’s currently in theatres as a feature length film.

This 40 hour a week gig is cool, let me tell you. I’ve never had a job where I could listen to National Public Radio without disturbing someone else. This setup affords me the ability to listen to This American Life, a radio program produced by Ira Glass, as long as I want. The program records daily life of American’s and tells their stories, the idea is quite intriguing. Glass coaches me through the day at times. This past week was the 388^th episode and called Rest Stop it has a pretty cool premise: stick five producers at a rest stop in New York and let them record for 24 hours. The stories are quite interesting; the five producers make a concoction that’s genius, creative and incredible. It’s truly incredible how they get people to divulge their life story - gets me. It may be that they are nationally syndicated. You may be thinking: Why the heck is William writing about public radio when he’s supposed to be talking about civic engagement, service learning, and community service? Well it’s funny that you should ask! Because there’s a podcast of sorts that talks about all these fabulous topics. Go to www.servicelearning.org, the name of the show is Bring Learning to Life: A Service-Learning Podcast. The most recent one is on “Maximizing Community Benefit through service-learning.” A podcast is something that I’ve been thinking about doing for MACC or for NSCC. What’s great about podcasts is their ability to be mobile. The tradition of oral story-telling is extremely effective, and it doesn’t hurt when you’ve got a good voice. To further its relevance to service-learning, community service, and civic engagement is extremely important. The service is our story being able to reflect on it teaches us something.

Jay Helmer, the MACC AmeriCorps*VISTA of Salem State College, and I took a trip two weeks ago to Rhode Island, the ocean state, to visit Rhode Island Campus Compact AmeriCorps*VISTAs for a recap of life and a small shin dig, along the way I brought a weekly newspaper called The Boston Phoenix. I’ve now grown an obsession with this rag of a weekly newspaper which stems from its writers. The writing is beaming with witty writers who’re given the opportunity to write in-depth articles, something that daily’s can’t afford. The paper is very informative giving insight to life in Boston and Greater Boston areas on books, film, arts, politics, and music. It really offers a diverse pool of topics. My at the moment honeymoon-like obsession with the paper will hopefully not fade. Until then my eyes will be fixated on the drop off point located at NSCC every Thursday waiting to devour its every word.

So, today is a national day of service in remembrance of September 11, 2009. Here at North Shore Community College, we hosted two AmeriCorps*VISTAs who are both serving with Massachusetts Campus Compact: Curtis Pope of Bunker Hill Community College and Jonathan Nystedt of Gordon in Lynn. Unfortunately we were unable to plan a Lynn-wide day of service or have our students do service, because of the time restraints associated with school having begun just this past Wednesday. This trio of *VISTAs still pulled through though. We did our civic duty by helping serve lunch at My Brother’s Table, a non-profit Soup Kitchen in Lynn; they also helped put signs up around campus for a food drive that began today at NSCC. All in all it was a pleasant day to do service.

I’ve started to be a little bit more laid back on finding out the needs of the community to focus a little bit of attention on recruiting students, building the leadership aspect of my work plan. You could say I’m multitasking or branching out of what I’ve been trying to do for the past month. Community organizing is not easy, building a leadership institute is not easy; higher education is not like it was as a student that’s for sure. One thing I’ve grasped is slowing down. It’s not like I can take out a wand and make it happen; even though Harry Potter could make it happen with a swoosh of his wand. Until next time!

Peace

2009-10-07T08:22:00.000-07:00

Good day all,

In the couple of weeks since my last blog post, I’ve started to settle into my role at Salem State. After about a month and a half on campus, I’ve begun to stop introducing myself as the “new” MACC AmeriCorps*VISTA/Civic Engagement Coordinator and have simply jumped right in to the work. What I love about being a *VISTA is the variety of the work, I can be in a t-shirt one day (helping to coordinate a service project) and a tie the next, talking to a senior level administrator. After my first few weeks in “t-shirt” mode helping to organize various projects for new student orientation, I’m now spending more time in ties meeting with administrators about community-based organizations with whom Salem State is looking to form deeper partnerships.

Classes have started, and students are back, which makes the campus buzz with so much more energy. Student clubs are starting to ask me about getting more involved in service, which is both exciting and encouraging as I begin to talk with community-based organizations about how Salem State might be able to better help those organizations achieve their goals.

I’m starting to feel more at home living in Salem too. Despite the visibility of the witch-trial-centered tourism, Salem is really a welcoming small New England city. I have gotten lost both walking and driving around the city (sometimes intentionally, sometimes not) and have found a number of great places to eat and cool things to see and do (other than those that are witch-related). Living in town and having some knowledge of Salem has been a valuable way to strengthen connections and earn credibility with community partners. I also believe that being comfortable in the community is important because as much as I’m very passionate about the work that I’m doing, having a life outside work is important to maintain a healthy balance during my VISTA year.

Jay H

Meet Jay Helmer, MACC AmeriCorps*VISTA

2009-09-03T07:20:00.000-07:00

Hello all,

My name is Jay Helmer, I’m coming to you from Salem State College where I serve as the MACC AmeriCorps*VISTA and Civic Engagement Coordinator. This is my second time around as a MACC AmeriCorps*VISTA, having served in 2006-07 before taking a two-year hiatus to pursue a Master’s Degree in higher education. I returned to MACC firmly committed to enhancing service and civic engagement, and because my first year as an AmeriCorps*VISTA was one of the most rewarding of my life.

As the first *VISTA at Salem State, I have the opportunity to help build a civic engagement program in two ways: first by assisting in the cultivation of partnerships with area community-based organizations, and secondly by creating and enhancing civic engagement opportunities for students, faculty and staff. As I write this, I have just cleared a huge stack of paper from my desk related to my first major project: coordinating a 19-project, 150-volunteer community service day for Resident Assistants and incoming students. My new position is in the Campus Center programs office, so it’s a hub of student activity, and the staff keeps me busy which is fun!

Today is the opening of the academic year and I am being formally introduced during a session for faculty and staff, so, as my supervisor said, “I won’t be anonymous much longer”. About a month into my year of service, my position has been everything I hoped it would be, and made even better by working with an incredibly talented tight-knit Corps of AmeriCorps*VISTAs.

Later,
Jay H

Introducing Lindsay Laguna!

2009-08-31T06:48:00.000-07:00

Hello, Folks! I’m Lindsay Laguna, proud MACC AmeriCorps*VISTA/Community Programs Coordinator at Boston University Metropolitan College. I’m serving in the department of Student and Corporate Outreach. Although I work in an office that does corporate outreach, I do not work directly with that aspect of the work. Instead I do more community outreach to prospective students at BU Metropolitan College primarily by spreading word about the Scholarship for Parents. I support other outreach efforts, but this scholarship really takes up the bulk of my focus. Rather than repeat everything on the Web site, here is a link that succinctly describes the scholarship:

http://www.bu.edu/met/scholarship/parents/

Before I go into more depth about my work and because I am serving at a university, let me give you a snapshot of my own upbringing and educational experience. I am 24 years old, was born and raised in Chicago, lived a few years in Park Ridge, IL, and graduated with a BA in International Studies with minors in Spanish and Sociology from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

After graduation, I worked in a variety of offices in a variety of universities mostly in Chicago. I did a year of service with the AmeriCorps program City Year Chicago. Since apparently I can’t get enough of AmeriCorps programs OR higher education, I now get the best of both worlds with MACC. I can’t think of a better fit for me right now.

I’ve only been with MACC/BU for a month, but this is probably the coolest work experience I’ve had thus far. I attended the Book Bag Drive (where I met the mayor), attend Middle O, a college fair, Chelsea’s Back to School Celebration, go on TV (BNN) with my manager Katherine and our Parent Scholar Joan, and got the scholarship on the BPS site under Family Resources (http://www.bostonpublicschools.org/node/39).

It is essentially my role to promote this scholarship to prospective Parent Scholars in the Boston and Chelsea communities. Since this is the 2nd year we are offering the scholarship, there is still much for me to do in terms of building community awareness of the scholarship and also keeping community members aware of the support that BU Metropolitan College offers to students “from application to graduation.”

Katherine and my VISTA predecessor Jessica have been wonderful in orienting me to BU and Boston in general. I’ve never felt so prepared for a new position, which means a lot since I’ve had quite a few positions these past few years.

That’s all for now! Till next time!

Peace,
Lindsay

Will Dowd's Journey North Shore Community College!

2009-08-25T07:32:00.000-07:00

Details quickly - names William Dowd, I studied print journalism and minored in political science at a small liberal arts college called Lock Haven University of Pennsylvania. I’m 23, originally from Atlanta, Georgia, and moved to a small town called Wellsville, Pennsylvania when I was 11 years of age. I came to Massachusetts by way of Wellsville. I’ve been placed at North Shore Community College as a MACC AmeriCorps*VISTA - charged with developing a student leadership program tailored to community service. It’s going to take a lot of work on the College’s part as well as mine. I’m one of about 30 other VISTA scattered in patches in different higher education institutions located all over this beautiful and stunning state, whether it’s my fellow AmeriCorps*VISTA member Margo all the way out in Amherst, placed at UMASS Amherst or someone as close as AmeriCorps*VISTA member Jay located at Salem State College – we’re truly patched all over.

Well, it’s a sunny Friday. I’m sitting in my new office at NSCC in Lynn. Yes, the city with the jingle that goes like this: Lynn, Lynn. The City of Sin, you never come out the way you went in. This tune of sorts is quite misleading though, Lynn has its rugged rough parts, but I’ve only met nice people thus far. The city is right off the bay, next to a beautiful island dubbed Nahant. In reference to Lynn’s location on the North Shore of Massachusetts it’s just below Salem, Swampscott, and right above Revere. I remember before moving here my friends were always confused because they thought Lynn was a person. So, I had to correct them – “No, no, no, I’m not moving in with Lynn, I’m moving to Lynn,” it was quite tiring after a while though it surely faded.

The experience thus far from spending a week in Boston at Northeastern University to receive training, visiting Salem for the Salem Jazz and Musical Festival at the Willows, taking adventures to Gloucester’s Harbor Beach and Nahant, meeting a group of people who carry the same values as I do, and will all be partaking in a year of service is truly rewarding.
Alright back to the office. I have an office with a window, looking out on Broad Street in Lynn a very busy section of the city. My office is fairly medium sized I’ll give you a mental breakdown - family photo’s on my right tacked to the large cork board, cold morning coffee - next to my black keyboard and the mouse pad, and of course the staple Merriam-Webster: dictionary and thesaurus –got to have those. Imagine for a second a square room with a purple door, windows straight ahead, white walls, book shelves on your left as you walk in and a desk place parallel to the window. I’ve been doing work on the computer for most of the day, so, these eyes are starting to become dry. I’m in need of some water. Now, I’ve decided to update Massachusetts Campus Compact AmeriCorps*VISTA blog with a post, to enlighten those who’ve been de-voided of posts and have just been dying to read the next.

I want to really just reflect on the last four weeks of my life living in “The Bay State,” - I can’t believe it has been that long. I feel like I just got here, the roller coaster, lifestyle of a VISTA for the first few weeks has been really go, go, go, here are the tools you need to succeed, now go make a difference in the world. So I’ve decided today to take a breather, step back, focus my attention on what’s happened and just let it flow. That roller coaster is starting to simmer down. Reflection is a huge part of service, I’m looking forward to this upcoming Friday’s reflection – it will be the first time everyone’s seen each other since we left Northeastern.
Prior to arriving at NSCC, as written before, I received a week of training at Northeastern University - we’re given a packet called the “work plan.” We got it on our third day of training, as vocal as I was about getting it, other VISTA’s started picking up on how wound up I was. But to me it was a big deal the work plan gives you a timeline of your project, has your job description, tells you who your supervisor is- and is pretty much a manual that guides your life for the next year. So that night, I must have skimmed through it like three or four times, as if I were reading Kerouac’s On The Road, it was like experiencing the taste of coffee for the first time. Most definitely, a rush was felt; I was already building a mental map of how to execute the plan. Not having any prior experience in developing a leadership institute, I was a little overwhelmed – but I understood that the plan has a mission statement, having four goals; the goals guide the mission statement, accomplishing these goals will achieve the mission of the institute. Hold that thought for couple of paragraphs.

The first three day’s consisted of nothing but meeting Vice Presidents, Directors and Deans who I had delightful, engaging, conversations with; they all have the best interest of students in hand. My supervisor and I ate at the International House of Pancakes on the second day; it was quite early in the morning, so coffee was in order. Lloyd is the name of my boss; he’s the Dean of Student life at the College and is the one who wrote the work plan and compiled the grant to get me - he’s a very sweet man wh0 also happens to be from the South – Mississippi to be exact. At the meeting we go over expectations and talk of our leadership styles, but we couldn’t help but get off track – we started talking about our taste in music and found out that we had some things in common, he also told me to take a Myers-Brigg test, wanting to know what type of personality I was, so he could best direct me. I made a mental note to use this with students.
After this casual morning meeting I walked out of IHOP full from two pancakes, 4 cups of coffee, two slices of toast, home fries, eggs – along with a new friend, a new professional colleague, and someone I know is going to be a great mentor. I am going to learn a lot from him within the next year.

It’s around 9:30 a.m. we arrived back at NSCC - I was greeted with my first office plant and a welcoming card both from the NSCC Human Relations Department. I’ve decided to call the plant, “Alfie” (I’m all about naming things, inanimate objects too) – the name in my opinion suits the small plant plotted in a squared yellow cereal bowl. I appreciate small acts of kindness like this one. Now, let’s see if I can take care of the plant, I’m betting on a couple of weeks, but I’m going to try to keep Alfie alive (especially since it was a gift too) as long as possible. This will be the test to see whether I can handle a cat or a dog later in life. Pam Nolan-Young a now dear friend of mine, a well educated woman, director of human relations gave me these gifts.
After meeting practically everyone in the College, I could finally sit down and work. First task - I needed to see how things would come together, that is grasping how to meet my goals, I worked it out with a dry erase marker in hand by pretty much locking myself in a room and a not allowing anyone in. So for three to four hours I created a web thoughtfully defining my goals, understanding them, and then tediously working out logistics. I’m having a meeting with Lloyd this week to go over it, before we present it to my focus groups, which will come later on in the next couple of weeks. Through my mapping and readings transcending departments is going to have to happen in order to meet the standards of higher education. Stakeholders aren’t just students, but all entities of the college.

My second week I started compiling a list of all the community based organizations in Lynn, Danvers, and Beverly – this took quite awhile, however, once it’s finished the end product will be useful. I also created a Google map outlining the community based organizations in the Lynn. Now, it’s time to set up one on one’s with these organizations to see what they need. So when students are looking for direct community service opportunities they intrinsically better themselves, but also meet the needs of the community.

My third week consisted of meeting with three community based organizations to perform one to one’s. I met with Lynn History Museum and Historical Society, Lynn’s alternative adult education program Bootstrap, and finally Gordon College in Lynn. My first big project is working with Diana Kerry, she is the Public Policy Institute director, and we will be collaborating to make hunger awareness and homelessness at the forefront of the College and Institute as for initiatives coming out of our offices. Beginning September 11th, a day of national service to October 9th NSCC will have a food drive to fill the food pantries all across the North Shore.
As we move forward and closer to the September 9th onset of students the energy on the professional side of NSCC is building. Our students will soon be walking through the halls in due course and in no time at all, they will be filling every nook and cranny of Lynn, Danvers, and Beverly campuses. It’s a sweet feeling to be a part of higher education, especially in a new environment, and on the other spectrum as professional. I’m excited to get the ball rolling. On September 9th – 10th at 7:30 a.m. in the morning I will be “Walking The Lines” for two days. “Walking The Lines” is a program for the first couple of days where faculty, administration, and staff hand out energy bars and water to students as they walk into each entrance.

All in all it’s going to be a great year; I mean it’s already off to a great start. Massachusetts is absolutely a beautiful state.

Peace out.

and so it goes...

2009-06-12T18:45:00.000-07:00

Well. I guess it's June, huh? It's been a long time since I've visited this blog. As the students left campus and all the craziness of campus happenings came to a close, I guess it didn't seem like there was much to update about. However, today was the last day of our Close of Service retreat at the Cape and as I sit at my desk, still thinking about the last three days (and the past year) I feel like this is the perfect time to re-visit this space. The retreat was a three day, fun filled wrap up to our spectacular year together as a Corps. We spent a bit of time congregated, celebrating all of our individual accomplishments as well as the accomplishments we made together. It was perfect, albeit tough.

It's been a really busy, crazy year and the past couple months have been especially insane. I am leaving Framingham State to transition into the role of one of the AmeriCorps*VISTA Leaders for MACC next year and so for the past month or so I have been finishing up my work at FSC while also getting things ready for the new Corps to come in July. It's been a really exciting time for me and in all that, I kind of forgot that the end with this Corps was coming and today it hit me like a ton of bricks. As we sat in a circle and had our final wrap up meeting, it was wonderful to hear about what all my fellow AmeriCorps*VISTAs were going to be doing next year and to share with them what I got out of this year. Hearing everyone talk about their plans one after another was like somebody slowly but surely turning the faucet on and by the time it got to me, I was an inarticulate emotional mess. I couldn't get my thoughts together and I'm sure I had a lot more to say to the group but tried to stop speaking as I was pretty sure I was making very little sense.

I just need to express (once more, as I have so many times before) how thankful I am for everything that I have gotten out of this year. The professional and personal growth I have experienced will only grow deeper with the year ahead and the relationships that I have made have been life changing and I can't imagine my life had I not chosen to do a year with MACC. I'm sure, like this morning, I am not even writing very coherently now. So, with that, I'll leave you. It's been quite a year. Here's to one more.

- Dana

National Volunteer Week and Awards

2009-05-06T06:30:00.000-07:00

As the semester rolls to a close, I've been busy around campus working on events -- and even winning an award. The week of April 19-25th was National Volunteer week; I reached out to our community partners and set up several volunteer opportunities for our students. Points of Light is the organization that heads up National Volunteer Week. Monday, we spent some time helping out the Boston Marathon, helping in the Family Reunion area. Tuesday we volunteered with Red Cross Blood Services, and I ended up helping in a medical incident with a donor, which was exciting, but not the kind of excitement I was hoping for. Wednesday, which was Earth Day, we volunteered with Earthworks an organization that helps do urban gardening. With Earthworks, we helped get a garden at the Hennigan School in Jamaica Plain ready for spring, weeding and doing other prep work in the rain! Thursday there were two projects, we volunteered with Cradles to Crayons, making clothing packages for needy children across Massachusetts. My last event was with Boston Living Center, where we helped serve a meal to clients living with HIV or AIDS. On Friday, there was a student run annual event known as Good Neighbor Day, which gets volunteers out into the local community.

In addition, this week I got to attend the 17th Annual Beacon Awards Dinner, an awards dinner for students and student groups. I nominated my ASB Group for the Award. Overall it was a successful night for our office; we had 2 students involved with our office winning major Beacon Student Leadership awards -- 5 students were chosen out of a pool of 30. Our Beacon Voyages for Service ASB to Galveston, TX also won the Beacon Student Group Service Award. I've got a beacon award sitting on my desk! We are excited about the success of our office this year, and I know next year will be a success as well! Here is me with some students and the award!

A Busy Time of Year

2009-04-14T07:15:00.000-07:00

The end of the school year is literally around the corner! We’ve been busy finishing up the final touches for several events over the next week. We have 3 students who applied and were recruited to BLAST (Beacon Leadership and Service Team) who were put in charge or created 3 different campus projects which will occur from this Saturday to next Friday. A few months ago they attended LeaderShape and now they are ready to make a big splash on campus! The projects include a leadership conference (which I will be presenting at, currently I’m working on my PowerPoint), a Health and Fitness Expo, and Good Neighbor Day (an annual day of volunteering). All of these events I am looking forward to! In addition I’ve secured volunteering sites Monday through Friday for National Volunteer Week. It will be a busy week, but I’m looking forward to getting outside, volunteering, and really having an overall great time!

~ Erika

Another day in the life...

2009-04-07T06:54:00.000-07:00

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

Back to Volunteering -- Monthly Service Projects!

2009-03-26T12:51:00.001-07:00

As I mentioned, I just got from ASB and came back to work this Wednesday. Right away, I had more service to do! I planned a small volunteer trip for our students Wednesday night. As part of our Monthly Service Projects program, our office organizes service projects for UMass Boston students once a month. This month we found ourselves at The Boston Living Center , an all around resource center for persons living with AIDS or HIV. We were there to serve dinner! Myself and 2 other UMass Boston students came and we worked with Franklin, the cook, in the kitchen. We prepared the dinner for the evening, making sure the food was ready to be put out. I got to serve at the juice bar and admired the variety of juice and other beverages available to clients. The students served the food to clients. We also got to try the awesome pesto pastas and cooked spinach. I really fell in love with the place and how well it is run. At the end of the night Bianca, one of the students, expressed her desire to continue volunteering there on a long term basis. That is a great success for me, as finding students long term service opportunities that match their interests is not necessarily an easy process.

I hope you future and present MACC AmeriCorps*VISTAs will make your way there! It is a great place to volunteer!

~Erika

Post Alternative Spring Break

2009-03-26T12:26:00.000-07:00

I had quite a week last week, a week that is hard to put into words. After about 6 months of planning, Alternative Spring Break actually occurred. Ever since I was a student, I've found myself spending time planning and eventually going on ASB trips doing hurricane relief and rebuilding. Three years ago, I found myself in New Orleans leading a group of 11 other students on a Habitat for Humanity build in East New Orleans. Last year, I ended up in Waveland, Mississippi working on a house with a homeowner the entire week with 17 advisers and students. This year, with 12 students from UMass Boston, we made our way to Galveston, TX. We worked so hard the entire week.

Day 1 and 2 we gutted a house in Galveston for Ida, a retired nurse. She returned the favor by taking us all out to Golden Corral, a southern buffet chain (YUM). Day 3 we led students in replanting beach grasses on the beach (thanks to Artist Boat, a nonprofit based out of Galveston) in hopes of keeping the dunes together and growing (more than 15 feet washed away in the storm). We also painted primer on Rosa's home, another Galveston resident. Day 4 we found ourselves trekking out to Surfside Beach, a local beach community and hot spot for summer vacationers in TX. On the drive to Surfside we saw businesses, homes, and the road (we drove on the beach 3/4 the way) utterly destroyed. While in Surfside, students worked on painting and power washing the deck of the local town hall, and a smaller group put up sand fencing to help protect and rebuild the dunes. We returned Friday to paint Rosa's home with a final coat (Avocado green!).

While having this experience was the highlight of my year -- it was physically and emotionally draining all at the same time. I led reflections at night and slept little. I'm still tired today, I haven't had much time to recover. We AmeriCorps*VISTAs are always on duty!

We had fun too though! We checked out Nasa and the Kemah Boardwalk, went to the largest Rodeo in the US, and got a glimpse of the waters around Galveston on an air boat tour. Lastly, we ate so much good food (seafood, burgers, Sonic -- there are no Sonics in MA!). I miss TX and want to go back and help more, but I know that I felt better being able to serve alongside fellow AmeriCorps members there -- I met a fellow Maryland Campus Compact AmeriCorps*VISTA and our amazing AmeriCorps*NCCC Leader Aparna while in TX.

I'm sharing a few videos of the experience on YouTube more are to come!

Yours in Service,

Erika

FSC has an Alt. Spring Break Weekend Get Away!

2009-03-17T11:49:00.000-07:00

This past weekend, I took a group of nine students to Holyoke, MA to work on the farm at Nuestras Raices. This was the first Alternative Break trip of any kind for Framingham State College, which is why we decided to stay pretty local and also why we chose to just do a weekend. Given the culture of Framingham State students, this was also the best fit. That culture being one of very hard working students, who often use their spring break as a means to work extra hours and earn a good chunk of money.

I was really excited about the trip because not only was it new to me and FSC, but the 9 students who came on the trip were all very new to volunteering in general. I would say about 2 or 3 of them had any experience volunteering, and it was amazing to see the transformation in them just over two days. On Saturday morning, when asked why they were there, their answers were all pretty identical to each other's, "I wanted to do something different for spring break" or, "I like helping people." Very generic, very basic...not very thoughtful. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a little disappointed as we went around the circle and I heard one after another repeat the same answer. However, I was really proud and touched on Sunday afternoon during our final reflection when their answers were all very unique and thought out. Each one of them showed with their responses in our reflection activity a personal attachment to the work they did over the weekend and a better understanding of why it mattered. I'd say this was probably my first proud moment as an advisor to college students, and I really loved it. I even love thinking about it now two days later!

On our trip we did a lot of great work. Half our group plotted out land for the farmers, and half the group cleaned up and took an inventory of tools in the sheds. The second day we moved a whole bunch of frame pieces for a new greenhouse they're building. We got a lot of work done in a very short period of time, and the people at the farm were very grateful for it.

I have to admit that while this project has definitely not been my favorite part of my AmeriCorps*VISTA year so far, I am very pleased that I decided to take it on. Looking back, it caused me a lot of stress and I remember thinking repeatedly, "I can't wait until this is all over." Don't get me wrong, I'm glad that it's done with and have a huge feeling of relief because of that. However, even though it's not something I necessarily loved doing, it was a really great opportunity for me to gain a lot of skills that I didn't have before. Logistical thinking and being very detail oriented are not necessarily two of my stronger points. In planning any kind of trip, those two skills are very important and so I definitely appreciate the opportunity to fine tune those areas of my skill set.

I'll close with some photos of our trip - Enjoy!!

Spring Semester -- In High Gear

2009-02-26T12:59:00.000-08:00

Hello AmeriCorps*VISTA Friends,

It has been a busy few weeks here in the office, with the director out of the office on vacation, I was in charge! A few weeks back at the beginning of February we had our office’s first ever spring volunteer fair (Spring Into Action: Volunteer and Opportunities Fair). Look at the cool poster I made!

Microsoft Publisher has become one of my biggest allies this year in advertising on UMass Boston’s Campus. School was out until the end of January, so things picked up real fast in the office.

The response to our autumn fair was so great we decided it was time for a spring fair. I was in charge of organizing it again, and surprisingly we had many new organizations present! Overall the fair went really well and turned out to be not too stressful despite the fact my supervisor was out sick, which meant I was running the fair literally all by myself! We had made connections with other organizations on campus too which was really nice, because they came to me asking to come to the fair and now I’m aligned with many of the student centers and offices on campus personally as I organized the fair.

Right now my work has been revolving around Alternative Break, with less than 1 month to the trip it is really push time to get everything done. We worked with a travel agent to book our plane tickets to Galveston and I just today reserved the vans we will be driving while down there. I’m sure I’ll have a ton of pictures to post once Alt. Break hits on the 15^th.

We’re also getting to that time of year where Corps members are starting to think about next year, and what is next. Many of the Corps members have been getting acceptance letters to graduate school, many are thinking about another year of service, and many can’t even wrap their heads around how far we’ve come.

Tomorrow is our half way point meeting with our Supervisors and MACC; I’m looking forward to tomorrow and how we are going to lay down sustainability for our programs into the future.

Yours in Service,

Erika

2009-01-14T11:11:00.000-08:00

Wow - January already? This year is flying by. The students are having their first day of classes here at Framingham State for the spring semester and things are just beginning to get really busy.

The months of November and December seem to have been blended together in my head for some reason, most likely because I was out of the office most of the month of December for our Early Service Training (aka EST) and following that, our holiday break. I thoroughly enjoyed myself at EST in December. The entire MACC*VISTA family stayed together at the Essex Conference Center in Essex, MA for most of the week of the 8th. It was really great to be able to reconnect with many of the VISTAs that I don't get to see on a regular basis, and also to get to spend more time with even the VISTAs I have become pretty close with. The time out of the office to sort of reinvigorate our sense of purpose was also excellent. I very much enjoyed the discussions and insight brought about by all of the workshops that we had as well as just the really valuable conversations I had with my fellow VISTAs during downtime.

I'll even provide for you a cute photo of all of us. Don't ask me why we've all got our hands in the air like that, I really have no idea.

More on the FSC front, all the way back in November the United Way and my office (Student Involvement) co-sponsored a day of service. We had about 20 student volunteers and we visited about 4 different houses in the Framingham & Natick areas raking leaves for homebound elderly people. We were nervous because the original date that we were supposed to hold this event was rained out, so we were unsure if many of our volunteers would come back for the rain date - and many of them did! We had a great turn out and though it was a long, very cold, day all of the students were in great spirits throughout the entire thing and at the end went home smiling.

This was the first coordinated day of volunteering that we did with the United Way, with whom we have a partnership that involves getting students more involved in the local community. Many of the students that came belonged to clubs that are service oriented, but many of them were pretty new to the volunteering scene. It was a really great experience. We even made it to the local newspaper, very exciting!

Here are a few photos of my students hard at work. I assure you that I, too, worked diligently...but someone had to take the photos!

Til next time,

Dana

2008-12-18T06:19:00.001-08:00

Dear Internet World,

It has been a while, has it not? With the winding down semester comes more time for writing! Many of the students at UMass Boston have headed home, and are awaiting the holiday season. Our classes officially end tomorrow and won’t resume until the 26^th of January. This means more fun planning for events and activities.

What have I been up to lately? Well last month was a huge month of events for us at UMass Boston. I planned almost all of the programming. I organized a speaker panel on Hunger and Homelessness with local organizations including One Family, MHASA (Massachusetts Housing and Shelter Alliance) and Homelessness Empowerment/Spare Change present. I also organized a Fair Trade awareness day and raffle which was really cool. I had items donated that were Fair Trade from jewelry to chocolate samples and we got to offer them to students, staff, and anyone in the building. I really enjoyed this event because it turned something I’m passionate about, food and fair trade, into part of my work plan!

We also did two volunteer days one at Habitat for Humanity and one at the Red Cross Food Distribution center. While at the Habitat for Humanity build day, we gathered a new group of students for service. There were 7 students present. I had only met one of the students before, but all who signed up showed up enthusiastic for the day. We had several different jobs throughout the day, including hammering, sawing metal bars, raking, and more. Despite the cold, we really got quite a lot of work done, and built a small community of workers and friends during the event. The vibe we had going was just all positive. We kept busy finding new jobs and the students present really worked hard at the site. I think the site coordinator was very happy with us at the end of the day. At another recent volunteer day during Hunger and Homelessness week, I volunteered at the Red Cross with a group of 8 students. Most of the students really wanted to do more volunteering work after the day of service, so I promised to continue to email them opportunities. Throughout the day we sorted food and handed it out to patrons. The students all were very enthusiastic, and again I only had met one of the students previously. One student got very lost, but despite her frustration, still managed to find her way to the shelter. Another student I was unable to meet during the event. On the train ride back into town she happened to notice I was on the same train as her. She came over to thank me for running the event, and was very excited for the service she had done.

I also just had my first fundraiser for Alternative Spring Break. We wrapped gifts at Borders bookstore. Borders offer a gift wrapping table and all supplies to non-profit organizations during the holidays, and we are able to collect donations. It was a ton of fun, we spent our down time trying to learn origami together and we rose over $100.00 between the two dates. The students got to know each other better and we had a blast (despite the lack of sleep from all present due to finals). ~Erika

Ah, the *VISTA life!

2008-11-06T10:40:00.000-08:00

Alternative Spring Break has become such a huge part of my life. When I got to Framingham State College, I was surprised to see no ASB program in sight and so my supervisor and I decided to play with my workplan a little bit to include ASB. I know it's something that many students want the opportunity to do and so I thought it would be pretty awesome to work with the students to make that happen here. I should tell you that I, as an undergrad student, never in my life planned an ASB or even went on one. That makes the whole process that much more exciting! Yes, it's been challenging to get the hang of all the details and whatnot, but I think (and hope) we are going to be pretty successful. I have selected two trip leaders and as such, the trip will be largely student run, which is a concept that I really value a lot. I place a lot of emphasis on leadership development in college students and am really excited to be able to help a couple of my own students to gain a pretty decent leadership experience in our ASB.

We also decided to keep the trip local, which I was nervous to tell the students, but I think it's going to be awesome. We are going to be in Boston doing service projects for the week of Spring Break which is helpful to us in our first year planning an ASB as it will take a lot of the big pressures off of us while we learn how to do this (transportation, etc). What I like the most about staying in Boston, though, is that my students are going to get a chance to make a real impact on their own community and will also be able to go back to their work site and see the difference they made, and volunteer with the organization again.

I have to admit that all this ASB business makes me kind of nervous, but I am excited to get this going and leave the program behind me when I leave FSC.

Also, lately I have been reflecting a lot on my decision to become a MACC AmeriCorps*VISTA and how satisfied I am with my choice. I know I have already talked about this before, but I feel the need to visit it again. Last night some of us MACC *VISTAs went to a VISTA social at BostonCares and met some other really awesome VISTAs from Massachusetts. That is, VISTAs who are not a part of Campus Compact. We played some fun, cheesy ice breakers (oh, how I love them) and got to hang out and talk to some really interesting people. I have to admit going into it I felt a tad awkward and was a little nervous to socialize, as I often get shy with new people (which is something most people who know me would tell you is probably a lie) but it was really fun. What I appreciated most was being able to visit the VISTAs from my own Corps that I hardly get to see. It's nice to have an excuse to get myself into Boston on a more regular basis, as I have come to find myself getting pretty attached to my friends in the Corps. Anyway, the point is, on very long T ride home last night, I thought so much about my career plans and the friendships I've gained because of MACC and would not change a thing in the world about my decision to serve this year!

Stay tuned, I'm having my first big volunteering day next weekend!

Much *VISTA Love,

Dana

Alternative Breakers Have Power

2008-10-27T11:55:00.000-07:00

One of the big projects I was working on these past few months was being on the planning committee for MACC’s annual Fall Alternative Break weekend, which was developed out in Holyoke. This year, as usual the break took place on Columbus Day weekend. With a core team of 5 MACC VISTAs and 2 VISTA leaders we went all out planning our weekend for students from across Massachusetts. Based on a train the trainers model, our FAB (Fall Alternative Break) was developed to help students find out what it takes to put on an Alternative Break while participating in service throughout the weekend. It is really a mini-alternative break!

The VISTAs were on committees including fundraising, outreach, and reflection and training. I was lucky, because I got to be on all three committees and was able to find out from all corners what it would take to put the weekend together. One of my main projects was to work on and then present an Alternative Break 101 training, which was presented by Kate Jennings and myself. We made a wonderful flip chart and got to utilize our public speaking skills all the while enhancing our own knowledge about Alternative Breaks.

Columbus Day weekend arrived, and I found myself engaged in service while volunteering for a very interesting organization out in Holyoke, MA – Nuestras Raíces. Nuestras Raíces is a grass-roots organization that promotes economic, human and community development in Holyoke, Massachusetts through projects relating to food, agriculture and the environment. They do a lot of work with the Puerto Rican community within Holyoke, and are expanding to include other peoples such as the Russian Immigrant community there. Here are some picture highlights!

-Erika

2008-10-22T08:27:00.000-07:00

Hello blog readers. So I have been totally slacking on my blogging duties and I apologize. Things around here have been busy and everyday I mean to get writing on updates and everyday it slips my mind. So today I have decided since it is rainy cold that it would be the perfect day to do some updating!

Things have been going relatively well. My work has taken all different turns and twists but I'm enjoying learning how the inner workings of this school. I have recently created a monthly newsletter dedicated to service that is happening in the Regis community. We call it RegiServes and it includes updates on our massive volunteer database project, volunteer opportunities on and off campus and we also spotlight a student, staff, faculty member or students groups that are doing GREAT things within the community! Since the holiday's are right around the corner I have included some Thanksgiving facts and the December issue will also include Christmas facts.

As I mentioned, we have started our massive campus wide volunteer database projects. Right now we are in the interview process, which is turning out to be a little more difficult then I thought it was going to be! A list of about 75 important people has been constructed and I am currently in the middle of interviewing and meeting with them to find out where and what their students or colleagues are doing in the community. It's a great concept and there is a huge need for one centralized place students, faculty and staff can locate volunteer opportunities, so I'm just hoping it all comes together by March! I mean, IT WILL!

I have been working closely with the office of Experiential Learning to help gather volunteers for a new community partner that has reached out to Regis College. Warm2Kids is a new center that has taken up residence in two Boys and Girls Clubs in Dorester. They are currently looking for students to help run programs and work in the centers. I went last week and got a sneak peak of the centers and met with the program directors. I'm hoping I can find a couple students who are able to work in the centers and really get these programs off the ground! Other then that, I am working to help the freshmen class (all 230) find volunteer opportunities for next semester and am working on a semester long reflection piece that will be done in and outside of the classroom. I truly believe reflection is a huge part of community service so I really like that I have been put in charge of creating and facilitating the piece!

I have been thinking a lot about home and friends/family I have been missing. Moving 700 miles from Detroit to Boston has been a huge adjustment but I think I have found a group of young professionals that work on campus that have taken up residence in my life. I can't stress how important it has been to be able to have these people around. I came here knowing no one and really questioning myself if I am strong enough to be here all alone. These last 3 months (WOW) have been a been learning period, not only learning about my new school/job but also about myself. Although, I cannot wait to head home for Thanksgiving and Christmas, I am really enjoying my time here. I even learned how to use the subway-so things are looking pretty good!

-Jessica Chandler, Regis College MACC AmeriCorps*VISTA

2008-10-02T12:00:00.000-07:00

I can't believe it is already October. I feel like I just got done with PSO yesterday. The office of Student Involvement is busy here at Framingham State College, and I'm trying to keep up to pace with all the craziness! Since I am the first VISTA here, I decided to talk a little about what my experiences have been as the brand new AmeriCorps*VISTA on this campus.

To say it's been overwhelming would be an understatement, but with that comes a profoundly rewarding feeling of really getting things done here. I arrived here in late July to an extremely warm office staff greeting me with open arms. They were largely unaware of what exactly my job was all about but my supervisor made sure to include me in the Staff Retreat agenda to go over my job, in addition to a general overview of what MACC and VISTA do (and what they do together =]). At the retreat, I used my flip-charting skills to wow my co-workers as I laid it all out for them. After I finished explaining about capacity building, engaging college students and making change - I felt much more comfortable with them and I could tell they were much more aware of what I was all about.

Sure, students still sometimes confuse me with a prior United Way volunteer who once sat at my desk, but my name is getting out there and things are definitely getting done.

I have done a lot of work to build upon the already existing partnership that FSC has with the United Way. My relationship with my contact there is awesome, we work very well together and are both new to our respective positions so the fact that we're learning together makes everything that much easier. We have decided to co-sponsor a day of service every semester. Just one for now until we get a better hold on getting these things together. This November we are doing a big day of raking for local elderly people and we have started recruiting volunteers for that. Additionally, we also place volunteers all over the MetroWest area together and have been pretty successful thus far with getting people interested. I have a Volunteer Opportunities distribution list that I send all different opportunities out to people on every day. Students have been pretty receptive.

The one big obstacle I have found so far is that at Framingham State, volunteering isn't anyone's "thing." Let me explain what I mean by that. Some people have Student Government as their "thing" or programming is their "thing"...at many colleges, volunteering and service is a "thing" that students have. Any given "thing" tends to be a students' main extra-curricular commitment. My goal is to make service a "thing" on this campus. We have already talked about creating some type of center for it in order to help with that cause. I think it will take a couple years to really accomplish this, but as long as I lay the brickwork, it can definitely be built upon and achieved.

I'm proud of the work I'm doing and definitely proud of the FSC staff who are so excited to be on board with these initiatives. Next up, Alternative Spring Break - Eek! That's another post entirely. =]

Til next time,
*VISTA Dana

A Busy Fall on Campus

2008-09-27T07:39:00.000-07:00

The past few weeks have gone into high gear at UMass Boston and with MACC. So I thought I would write some about two of my favorite events that have occurred so far, both of which are annual events that I was to organize and lead. The first project was Good Neighbor Day, which occurs in the fall and spring. Good Neighbor Day at UMass Boston usually consists of a single event the premise of which is to get students involved in the local community. This year Sherrod, the Director of our office, and I had the idea of doing onesie and bib decorating for an organization known as Dorchester Cares , which provides gift baskets to new mothers in Dorchester. We found this a fitting event as UMass Boston is a part of this community and we want UMass Boston to become more recognized as a participant and activist within Dorchester. We set up during the day outside of the Campus Center, and found curious students lining up to decorate onesies and bibs. It was a great event because it was a little bit outside of the box and repainted students ideas about service can be.

Then I was put in charge of organizing the UMass Boston Volunteer Fair. I started almost from square one for this event, although I had some pictures from past fairs and a few intake forms to look over that had been submitted by organizations who participated in the past. I was unsure about how to run a volunteer fair, but this was a project I just had to dive right into. We booked space to hold the fair a month and half in advance and decided to order lunch for those who would come out to our campus. I knew of many community partners in the Boston area, as I had done a lot of work setting up volunteer trips as an undergraduate student so I knew I would want to invite them to our fair. In order to find groups to come, I decided to contact the community organizations whom I saw in pictures of prior fairs and I also decided to look to community partners I worked with as an undergraduate student, because keeping those connections alive was very important to me. So the first step to making the fair a success was for me to get in contact with these folks and invite them to our fair. I began advertising, and started to be contacted by more and more groups. UMass Boston is known for its community engagement, but many of the groups I contacted, or who contacted me had never been to UMass B to recruit for volunteers, so it was a new community they were excited to engage with in conversation in the hopes of attaining more volunteers for their projects. Response was slow, but before I knew it I had upped our table count to 40 and was expecting at least 38 different organizations at the fair. I hung posters, sent out emails, and waited for the day to arrive while busily organizing the last minute details of parking passes, lunch, and transit. Then the fair arrived, and students flocked to the fair, all of the groups who came walked away willing to participate, and had a full stomach from lunch. Now because of the success of the Fall Volunteer Fair, we will have one in the spring as well!

Welcome to the MACC AmeriCorps*VISTA Blog - Dana's Journey to VISTA

2008-09-23T11:24:00.000-07:00

Hello! I'm Dana Lyford, I am the MACC AmeriCorps*VISTA at Framingham State College and this is my first year serving as a VISTA. I was born and raised in Central, Mass. and just recently graduated from Worcester State College where I spent a wonderful four years realizing my passion for higher education and student affairs. While at Worcester State, I earned my degree in English with a concentration in Writing and was very active in the college community.

My plan since my sophomore year was to graduate from WSC and move on to a Master's program in Student Affairs immediately. I even went so far as to apply and get accepted to a Master's program all before I joined the VISTA program. It was a really spontaneous decision I made to sit down at my computer and visit www.americorps.gov one afternoon and ever since then I couldn't stop thinking about joining AmeriCorps. I looked through many programs, and I was very surprised and pleased to come upon the MACC*VISTA program because I never could have imagined being to join my desire to give back to my community with my passion for higher education. I applied for the MACC*VISTA position and after I got accepted it didn't take me long to make the decision to join up with the program and put grad school off for a year.

I didn't fully understand when joining how beneficial this program was going to be for me, both personally and professionally. I came into it kind of blindly, unsure of what to expect but after meeting my fellow VISTAs and hanging out with them for the week of Pre-Service Orientation, I knew I was in the right place. Not only have I come across a giant new group of friends that I know I can count on, but I've come into a network of wonderful professionals who I know I can turn to for support any time I need it. Every day I am thankful for my decision to join as a MACC AmeriCorps*VISTA.

Growing up in Massachusetts, MACC was a perfect fit for me. I have called the Bay State home for 22 years and have absorbed everything it has to offer. I couldn't be more thrilled to be a part of a program who works so hard to strengthen education for the people of Massachusetts.

I look forward to an exciting year, and am happy to be on board to get things done for America!

*VISTA love,

Dana

Welcome to the MACC AmeriCorps*VISTA Blog!

2008-09-18T07:09:00.000-07:00

My name is Jessica Chandler and I am a 1st year AmeriCorps*VISTA member. I am working at Regis College in Weston, MA and I am currently getting lots of things done for America! I am a recent graduate of Saginaw Valley State University in Saginaw, Michigan with a Bachelor of Social Work degree. I was born and raised in Detroit, Michigan but realized there was so much more out there for me and I knew it was now or never.

My MACC journey started in March of 2008 when I was trying to decide if I wanted to pursue graduate school, a real job or take my life in a different direction for a couple of years. I successfully choose the last option. I knew there were a few things I wanted: 1) to work with students my age and in a college setting, 2) to get out of Michigan and 3) to do something meaningful with my life. I have always been passionate about service and volunteering so I figured what better way to accomplish my three goals then to join AmeriCorps. I researched and spoke with people who knew more about the different programs then I ever could and narrowed down my search. Applied to the MACC program, was accepted then waited to find out where I would be spending my next year.

Through MACC and the AmeriCorps*VISTA program, I have been given so many opportunities. This is not one of those programs where you are thrown into a set of circumstances and you must go at helping to change the world by yourself. I feel completely supported and know if I ever need anything I have 30 some odd people waiting to help me along the way. The reputation, resources, support and organization were among the many things that drew me to the MACC program. Moving 700 miles away was not easy but knowing that I'm not going at it alone has been very comforting.

Although, I have not been at Regis very long I certainly have a great job! My work plan has taken different shapes and forms but I really like what I am doing. I get to do a lot of the behind-the-scenes work for our freshmen students and I am made to feel like my opinion counts and I am part of the staff. I am currently working on helping find community service placements for roughly 250 students and working on a semester long reflection piece that will be used in the spring semester. I also have been given big projects to head up and work on such as a community partner database and a volunteer e-newsletter for our campus community. My great supervisor has also given me chances to branch out and work with other offices on our campus. He has given me the opportunity to help out in other areas that I am passionate about and gain some experience in the world of higher education.

Thinking about it now I couldn't imagine doing or being any other place then I am right now. Although, I do occasionally miss home and the life of a college student, I know I am right where I need to be. I'm not sure how the next year is going to turn out but I can't wait.

Welcome to the MACC AmeriCorps*VISTA Blog -- Erika's VISTA Story

2008-09-11T06:53:00.001-07:00

Hello internet world! Welcome to the new MACC (Massachusetts Campus Compact) AmeriCorps*VISTA Blog, we hope this will be a resource to you all in getting to know what we MACC VISTAs do in our everyday lives while making a difference in the Commonwealth! Now first, let me introduce myself. My name is Erika Rydberg and I am a first year MACC VISTA here in Massachusetts. I was born and raised in the lovely town of Easton, MA which is 30 miles directly south of Boston. After graduating high school, I became one of the many young people whom flock to Boston to attend college or university.

I attended Emerson College in downtown Boston, which is mainly known for its quirky student body, and its communication and arts curriculum. White at Emerson I studied Communication Studies and Writing, Literature, and Publishing. I found myself extremely involved in campus life from playing tennis to being on the class board, but I found my passion in doing service. My dormitory life consisted of living in a "learning community" where I was placed to live amongst people with a similar interest, which happened to be service. Our floor was known as the "Leadership through Service" Floor (LTS) and we took classes themed around our interest with titles such as Local Action Global Change and Research Writing: Art in Action. My fellow LTSers and I often found ourselves participating in service projects on the weekends. From my humble beginnings on the LTS floor, I joined and became president of an on campus service group known as Imagine. One of my proudest achievements while in school was from my work founding an Alternative Spring Break program, which still exists at Emerson today.

So here is the big question - why did I join MACC VISTA? I was someone who dreamed of doing Peace Corps, but as I engaged myself in service from volunteering for four summers with families affected by 9/11 to volunteering in my local community while in Boston, I realized that I really wanted to start doing service at home. Between realizing that I found change on my home front critical to my personal growth and education, and also wanting to give back to the Massachusetts community that gave me so much, I decided to apply to become a VISTA.

I found out about MACC because of two core people in my collegiate education - the Director of the Service Learning and Community Action office at Emerson, and the Assistant who happened to have been a MACC VISTA when I began college. Heather, the Assistant at Emerson, helped me start the Alternative Break program and became one of the most powerful albeit non-traditional teachers for me while in college. She also became a good friend and ally, and although she was only a few years older than me, I felt she was someone who became a powerful service-learning change agent at Emerson and gained a lot from her experience as a VISTA. It was Heather, the Assistant, and Jen, the Director, who inspired me to take a chance and continue doing the work I loved doing while an undergraduate at Emerson. Once I was told more about MACC I decided it would be somewhere where I would want to spend a year of my post-undergraduate life.

And nothing more than an abracadabra later, I find myself a MACC VISTA working at UMass Boston. I work within the Student Leadership and Community Engagement Office and am working on several projects including Beacon Voyages for Service (an Alternative Break program), Hunger and Homelessness Week, and a big UMass Boston Volunteer Fair. Stay tuned for more information on the day to day in my next post!

Yours in Service,

Erika