Americorps

By Teddy S. Harrison

Graduate Student, Center on Philanthropy at Indiana University

AmeriCorps is an exciting program that involves more than 75,000 Americans each year who work to meet community needs (Lenkowsky 2004). Voluntary service in AmeriCorps may be either full or part-time. Service is provided to communities through all kinds of nonprofits, public agencies, and religious organizations. One branch, AmeriCorps *VISTA, is Volunteers in Service to America. It is a yearlong commitment and its members work to "bring individuals and communities out of poverty" (AmeriCorps). Another branch is AmeriCorps *NCCC, which stands for the National Civilian Community Corps. This is where an individual "between the ages of 18-24" commits to a "10-month, full-time residential service program" (AmeriCorps).

In the application process, a person chooses several different places where she might like to live while she works for a year in AmeriCorps. She lists them in order of preference. Usually she´s placed with one of her first three choices. In return for this year of work she gets job experience, special training, a small amount of money for monthly living expenses, and another award that may go for education or college loans. The AmeriCorps programs work on "environment, education, public safety, and other human needs" (AmeriCorps *NCCC Member Handbook 2001). When someone joins AmeriCorps, she is an employee of a charity or organization that has received money from the government. The organization uses the money to recruit and employ individuals, and they follow AmeriCorps regulations. There are over 1,000 different employers in the AmeriCorps program, such as Habitat For Humanity and Catholic Charities. There is a limit to the number of years a person may work in AmeriCorps and receive the education award.

"The mission of AmeriCorps is to provide opportunities for Americans of all ages to help improve the nation through service—making our streets safer, our environment cleaner, our children healthier, and our schools better" (AmeriCorps *NCCC Member Handbook 2001, n.p.).

AmeriCorps has four objectives:

1. "Get Things Done," through community service that focuses on problems in education, public safety, environmental and other targeted areas.
   
   
2. "Strengthen Communities," through the united efforts of many individuals from different backgrounds.
   
   
3. "Encourage Responsibility," through action, training and recruitment of other volunteers.
   
   
4. "Expand Opportunity," as a reward to community service through education awards"money for college" or end-of-service awards (AmeriCorps *NCCC Member Handbook 2001, n.p.).

Historic Roots

The reasoning behind AmeriCorps comes from a long historical tradition of community service through civic associations. As early as 1835, the French nobleman and philosopher Alexis de Tocqueville noted, in his book Democracy in America, how very important groups of people working together were to the health of our democratic society (Tocqueville 2000).

In the 20th century, America´s "tradition of service" has taken a lot of different forms. One was President Franklin D. Roosevelt´s Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC), where four million people worked to restore parks, revitalize the economy and support their families. Later, with World War II, the G.I. Bill "linked service to education" as a reward for community service. Then John F. Kennedy founded the Peace Corps. Also in the 1960s, during the Lyndon B. Johnson administration, VISTA was created to help poor communities. VISTA later became a part of AmeriCorps. Other programs were also started for older Americans in community service, and in the 1970s and 1980s hundreds of grassroots "urban and rural youth" groups developed across the nation (Guide to the Corporation For National Service 1997).

This led to "support for the passage of the National and Community Service Act of 1990" and President Bill Clinton, in 1993, expanded "opportunities for Americans to serve their country and earn awards for their own education in return." Congress approved this law and "President Clinton signed the National and Community Service Trust Act on September 21, 1993" (Guide to the Corporation For National Service1997, n.p.). The Corporation for National Service oversees three branches—AmeriCorps, National Senior Service Corps, and Learn and Serve America (Hartzell 1997). This corporation "supports services at the national, state, and local levels" and through it more than a million Americans each year serve their communities (A Guide to Effective Citizenship Through AmeriCorps 2001, n.p.).

Importance

There are many important reasons for having national service programs like AmeriCorps. It provides a chance for young people to work in areas of need in their communities. It gives them help in meeting college tuition costs. It also gives help to charities and faith-based organizations. It works to fix serious problems in America´s neighborhoods so that everybody in the country may have a better life.

AmeriCorps gives young people a way to invest in the wellbeing of other people and in the welfare of the nation in general. It also gives them a chance to develop important job skills, and it teaches these young people how to be better citizens. In short, it builds a better future for America.

Ties to the Philanthropic Sector

The AmeriCorps program is very tied to the philanthropic sector. AmeriCorps members work in the program by becoming employees of a charity, religious social services organization, public agency or school. These agencies apply to the Corporation for National Service for money and, if they are approved, receive a federal grant which they may use to hire people in the AmeriCorps program (e.g. the AmeriCorps *NCCC program´s ten-month commitment).

So this support of the philanthropic sector comes in two important ways: from government money, and from people who choose to work in the program. By working together, they support worthy charities and they make communities across the nation stronger.

Key Related Ideas

Community service is a term that used to mean "unpaid work, intended to be of social use, that an offender is required to do instead of going to prison" (The Concise Oxford English Dictionary). It has since come to be used more generally. Sometimes it means voluntary action, like those people who choose join AmeriCorps.

National service is a term that used to mean "a period of compulsory service in the armed forces during peacetime" (The Concise Oxford English Dictionary). Several countries around the world have established service programs. One might work in the army or in civilian service, so the term is no longer a just a military one. It still means service toward one´s country.

Volunteer is a term that generally means "a person who freely offers to do something" or "a person who works for an organization without being paid" (The Concise Oxford English Dictionary). But it is also used to describe an AmeriCorps or Peace Corps volunteer because these programs focus on community service and improving people´s lives, and the amount of money a person gets while she is in the program isn´t very much. It´s just enough to meet basic living needs. The real rewards in AmeriCorps are feeling good about making neighborhoods better, gaining job experience and the educational award, which may be put toward student loan debt in college.

Important People Related to the Topic

By the very nature of the AmeriCorps program, each person who participates is an essential part of its overall success. But the following three people have helped the program in very significant ways.

• George W. Bush (1946— ): George Bush is the 43rd President of the United States. He is a Republican politician, and was former governor of Texas from 1995-2000 (The Biographical Dictionary 2004). President Bush is the only President in U.S. history to expand a National Service Program that he didn´t create, taking AmeriCorps numbers from 50,000 to 75,000 annually (Lenkowsky 2004).
  
  
• Bill Clinton (1946— ): Bill Clinton was the 42nd President of the United States, from 1993-2001. A Democratic politician, President Clinton was also a professor at the University of Arkansas Law School, attorney general of Arkansas, and Governor of Arkansas from 1979-1981, and from 1983-1992. He supported AmeriCorps as a way to provide community service and also as a way for young middle-class people to help pay for college. He signed the National and Community Service Trust Act in 1993 (The Biographical Dictionary 2004).
  
  
• Leslie Lenkowsky (1946— ): Dr. Leslie Lenkowsky is the Director of Graduate Programs for Philanthropic Studies at the Center on Philanthropy at Indiana University—Purdue University at Indianapolis (IUPUI). President Bush appointed him to the head of the Corporation for National and Community Service, where he served from 2001 to 2004. Dr. Lenkowsky states that his mission was to "preserve and improve" the program (Lenkowsky 2004).

Related Nonprofit Organizations

• Catholic Charities, USA, is one of the nation´s largest faith-based social services networks. It provides social services to people in need regardless of what church they belong to. Established in 1910, it is a major employer for AmeriCorps volunteers, and its website is: http://www.catholiccharitiesusa.org.
  
  
• Habitat for Humanity is an international, nonprofit, faith-based organization that builds affordable homes for people in need. Its website is at http://www.habitat.org. It began in 1976 and is supported by former President Jimmy Carter. Habitat is also an employer for AmeriCorps volunteers. It is worldwide and by the year 2005 it will have built 1 million homes.
  
  
• Points of Light Foundation & Volunteer Center National Network is another organization that works for community service across the nation, encouraging all kinds of people to volunteer. This organization believes that volunteering isn´t just "nice," but it is "necessary." It also believes in getting people in need involved. One can learn more at: http://www.pointsoflight.org.
  
  
• Teach For America is a national service program that was the vision of a college student, Wendy Kopp, in 1988. In this program, college graduates teach for two years in "the nation´s neediest urban and rural public schools." Its website is at http://www.teachforamerica.org and contains the history of the organization and how to get involved. Since 1990, more than 12,000 people have participated in the program and there are over 22 sites around the country.

Related Web Sites

The Corporation for National Service website, at http://www.nationalservice.org, is the website for Senior Corps, AmeriCorps, and Learn and Serve. From this website, one can read about all three programs. One can also read about the background, get news, and general information about jobs.

The Global Service Institute website, at http://gwbweb.wustl.edu/csd/gsi/, is a group of organizations from around the world that are committed to civic service. The website has a section in Spanish. [No longer available]

The Peace Corps website, at http://www.peacecorps.gov, is where one may find out about volunteering all over the world, instead of just in America which is the AmeriCorps program. This website has the history and mission statement of the Peace Corps, benefits and options, step-by-step instructions for how to apply, and much more.

The USA Freedom Corps, at http://www.usafreedomcorps.gov, is a network that seeks to develop a "culture of service." This website refers to President George W. Bush´s 2002 State of the Union call to service, and it also provides a link to AmeriCorps.

The Youth Serve America website, at http://www.ysa.org, is the homepage for another service organization that began in 1986. It works with thousands of groups to offer volunteer activities at the local, national and global levels. One of the programs it sponsors is National Youth Service Day.

Bibliographic References

AmeriCorps. Who We Are. Accessed 31 October 2004. http://www.americorps.gov/about/ac/index.asp

"Bill Clinton." The Biographical Dictionary. [database online]. Accessed 31 October 2004. Available from IUPUI University Libraries.

"community service n." The Concise Oxford English Dictionary. [database online]. Accessed 31 October 2004. Available from IUPUI University Libraries.

Corporation for National Service. AmeriCorps *NCCC Member Handbook. Washington, D.C. 2001.

Corporation For National Service. Guide to the Corporation For National Service. Washington, D.C. February 1997.

Corporation For National Service. Guide to Effective Citizenship Through AmeriCorps. Washington, D.C. August 2001.

"George W. Bush." The Biographical Dictionary. [database online]. Accessed 31 October 2004. Available from IUPUI University Libraries.

Hartzell, Nedra Klee. Life After AmeriCorps: Next Steps. Washington, D.C.: Corporation for National Service, 1997.

Lenkowsky, Dr. Leslie. Interview by Teddy Harrison. Notes, 30 September 2004. AmeriCorps and Autobiography.

"national service n." The Concise Oxford English Dictionary. [database online]. Accessed 31 October 2004. Available from IUPUI University Libraries

Tocqueville, Alexis de. Democracy in America. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2000. ISBN: 0226805328.

"volunteer n." The Concise Oxford English Dictionary. [database online]. Accessed 31 October 2004. Available from IUPUI University Libraries.