The Impact of AmeriCorps Service on its Volunteers

06/24/2008 07:17:42 PM EST by ailee in Action Network Forum

In a study released in May of this year (Still Serving: Measuring the Eight-Year Impact of AmeriCorps on Alumni), the Corporation for National and Community Service along with Abt Associates, Inc, an independent, nonpartisan research firm, concluded that service in AmeriCorps had a significant positive impact on alumni’s lives and careers.

The Impact of AmeriCorps Service

06/24/2008 04:08:13 PM EST by arun08 in Action Network Forum

AmeriCorps and other national service programs have been shown to have great positive impact on their respective issue areas (whether it be education, housing, disaster relief, etc.) but these programs also appear to have a very positive impact on their volunteers.

My Visit to Hands On Atlanta

06/23/2008 06:31:16 PM EST by ailee in Action Network Forum

Yesterday, Arun (the other ServeNext intern for Atlanta) and I visited Hands On Atlanta, a non-profit organization that helps individuals, families and corporate and community groups find volunteer opportunities. We spotted the building easily by the giant blue handprint—the Hands On logo—that it boasted. After a few wrong turns, we finally found ourselves walking through its doors. I had no idea what to expect.

A Pacifist’s Thoughts on the Virtues of War

06/20/2008 03:15:18 PM EST by ailee in Action Network Forum

American psychologist and philosopher William James (1842-1910) made it clear throughout his life and in his writings that he was staunchly anti-war. Yet in his essay, “The Moral Equivalent to War,” he recognized a situation in which war would actually be preferable to peace. For James, the fundamental difficulty of politics was to preserve national unity. In the absence of the external threat of war, a nation would no longer be able to preserve the unity and martial values that he believed were absolutely crucial to its survival. But given the technological advances he witnessed, even then at the turn of the 20th century, warfare “becomes impossible and absurd from its own monstrosity.”

A Call in Support of Service

06/18/2008 11:22:45 PM EST by arun08 in Action Network Forum

If the next President is serious about expanding and supporting national service, then he must call upon every citizen very early in his presidency to get involved.  A perfect time to do this would be his Inaugural Address in January 2009.  By publicizing national service early on, the new President could raise awareness about various service programs and inspire citizens.  As great as AmeriCorps is, unfortunately John McCain was right when he wrote in his article in the Washington Monthly seven years ago that most Americans “say they have never heard of the program.”  We know that both Barack Obama and McCain both support national service and both have plans to expand them to scale.  Several other politicians have made it clear that they also support the movement and will push legislation in Congress to expand and sustain national service.  Taking these elements as a given, the best thing the next President could do is rally public sentiment and awareness towards national service in order to hasten the changes necessary.  Politicians will treat the subject with more urgency the more people speak up in support of the movement.  Essentially, I feel the best thing the next President could do to expand national service would be to do basically the same job we are trying to accomplish at ServeNext: to educate the public and leaders of the values and benefits of national service for America.  Simply hearing the President talk about national service in depth can go a long way in not just changing, but more like creating the positive public image that national service deserves.  When the public is mobilized in full support of such a bipartisan movement, there is very little that could stop it.

“The Moral Equivalent of War”

06/18/2008 09:50:40 PM EST by arun08 in Action Network Forum

William James’ “The Moral Equivalent of War” is thought to be part of the beginnings of the national service movement.  By substituting war with a “moral equivalent,” James seeks to replicate the same sense of patriotism, honor, and sense of duty that comes from the military without all of the bloodshed.  In this way James believes the country can preserve itself as a viable nation.  The modern interpretation of this “moral equivalent of war” is a war against all that is wrong, unjust, and unbalanced within the nation and the world itself, such as poverty, illiteracy, malnutrition, natural disasters, and many other problems.  It should come to very little surprise that when John F. Kennedy announced in 1961 on the steps of the University of Michigan the creation of a federal agency with the goal of battling these problems all across the world, he chose to call the agency the Peace Corps.  As national service is interpreted to be a substitute for war, such follows that the Peace Corps could be a substitute for, perhaps, the Marine Corps.  Thus follows the creation of Clinton’s AmeriCorps and Bush’s Freedom Corps.  Naming these national service agencies in this way directly attributes the equivalency of their purpose and nature to the war making of the Army, Navy, or Air Force just as William James described.  Today national service programs still think of their volunteer forces as “troops” that can be “deployed” to certain issue areas to solve problems in the nation and around the world, just as military troops are deployed to fight enemies.  It is a concept that has functioned well for the national service movement, and leads and will continue to lead to active civic engagement without bloodshed.

Is a “Secretary of National Service” possible in our future?

06/18/2008 09:48:08 PM EST by arun08 in Action Network Forum

Of the many suggestions proposed to strengthen national service, one that would make a virtually immediate impact would be transforming the Corporation for National and Community Service into a Cabinet-level department reporting directly to the President.  Firstly, such an action would show that the government is incredibly serious about expanding national service to scale.  With the President interacting with a Secretary of National Service on a nearly daily basis, achieving the goal of increasing national service to one million volunteers would come swiftly and efficiently.  It also would bring a great deal of public attention to national service.  I know plenty of college-age people that have the capability and will to serve if only presented with the chance.  A full-fledged Department of National Service would put the topic on the forefront of the minds of many engaged Americans.  Secondly, the establishment of such a Cabinet position would legitimize national and community service in the eyes of many Americans as a totally valid and fruitful way to give back.  Unfortunately, currently to much of the youth in this country, community service is seen as something to be done to “look good for college” or as part of sentence for a misdemeanor crime.  One only has to look to pop culture to see the state of things.  In the first season of the popular CBS sitcom How I Met Your Mother, the main character Ted Mosby discovers that his womanizing, self-centered, alpha-male friend Barney Stinson volunteers at a local soup kitchen and enjoys the work immensely, enough to be named “Volunteer of the Month”.  Ted spends the entire episode wondering how a self-seeking guy like Barney could possibly enjoy volunteering, only to discover near the end of the episode that Barney was performing community service as part of his sentence for getting arrested for public urination (on the side of a church, no less).  Creating a Department of National Service would show that the government believes increased service would be a positive thing for communities, not just as part of a sentence.  Thirdly, a future Secretary of National Service could coordinate with other cabinet level departments such as Health and Human Services, Housing and Urban Development, Labor, and many others.  Such cooperation could lead to solutions to tackle the current healthcare crisis and energy crisis that many Americans face today through specified national service programs such as the proposed “Health Corps” and “Green Corps”.  With a Secretary of National Service present, other departments would also be inspired into creatively using national service to solve issues.
    We already know that the next President will support national service.  Yet creating a Cabinet level position for it would probably be the best thing that could happen for the public perception of national service.  Time will tell if such a plan could become reality.