The Kennedy Serve America Act, signed into law in April, offers the national service community an unprecedented opportunity to expand service at the local level and offer far more citizens a chance to serve in their communities. The Act also poses a huge challenge to national service programs — the opportunity to increase the number and size of individual corps without weakening the impact of service, or diluting support for corps members, host organizations, etc.
State service commissions—appointed by state governors and responsible for the bulk of AmeriCorps funds distribution Continue reading →
A new film shares the story of an community of service in Maine.
On Veteran’s Day, The Way We Get By — a new documentary about senior volunteers who staff a welcome center in the airport at Bangor, Maine, to receive returning military folks — will premiere on PBS stations as part of POV, “documentaries with a point of view.” (Check the broadcast schedule.)
From the show’s synopsis:
On call 24 hours a day for the past five years, a group of senior citizens has made history by greeting over 900,000 American troops at a tiny airport in Bangor, Maine. The Way We Get By is an intimate look at three of these greeters as they confront the universal losses that come with aging and rediscover their reason for living. Bill Knight, Jerry Mundy and Joan Gaudet find the strength to overcome their personal battles and transform their lives through service. This inspirational and surprising story shatters the stereotypes of today’s senior citizens as the greeters redefine the meaning of community.
Last year, Atlas Corps won America’s Giving Challenge, and this year it’s in the running again — but it needs the support of people like you who care about service, crossing borders, and professional development for people dedicated to working in social impact careers from all over the world.
Atlas Corps, a year-long international service fellowship which sends U.S. residents abroad as well as brings foreign nationals to the United States to serve in nonprofits, is currently in sixth place in the overall competition that rewards the number of daily donors, not the total amount raised through the competition. Your daily donation of $10 can help Atlas Corps win, as it did last year.
$50,000 will be awarded to the cause with the highest total number of unique daily donations over the 30 days of the Challenge. $25,000 will be awarded to the causes with the second and third highest total number of unique daily donations over the 30 days of the Challenge. $10,000 will be awarded to the next five causes with the highest total number of unique daily donations over the 30 days of the Challenge.
So far, over $1.3 million dollars has been donated to 7,600+ organizations, through the competition—by over 70,000 donors. Atlas Corps’s had nearly 2000 donors.
Last year Atlas Corps not only raised $33,000 through America’s Giving Challenge, but also won the $50,000 grand prize for having the most donors. The organization, headed by Scott Beale, went onto to win $20,000 from an online Ideablob competition. (Read more about these online contests here.)
I plan to donate daily this week because I believe that Atlas Corps’s mission of bringing nonprofit professionals from the Global South to serve in the U.S. nonprofit sector stands to strengthen our perspectives as well as help us discover new ways of solving problems. As a Returned Peace Corps Volunteer, I also admire Atlas Corps’s efforts to send mid-career U.S. nonprofit professionals overseas — people who have a great deal of targeted skills, and who already speak the host country language fluently and can jump into short-term, high-skill roles at partner organizations. Atlas Corps is completely privately funded, and has only recently emerged from its pilot phase.
To join this free presentation, please refer to the login information below.
October 30th — 2:00pm Eastern/11:00am Pacific How can national service members set themselves up for success during the term?
What can you do to make the most of your term of service so that your career transition is fulfilling rather than intimidating?
Discerning your next steps (through evaluation, reflection, and other specific exercises)
Building additional, strategic relationships and skills that put you closer to your goals
Documenting and displaying your accomplishments to impress potential employers or admissions committees
Learning the nuts and bolts of a job search as your service term nears an end
This simulcast offers national service participants detailed specific steps and necessary tools to emphasize their own professional development, even as they are tackling intractable social concerns and building a better community through their service. The simulcast emphasizes practical suggestions, given corps members’ budget and time constraints, diverse activities, and varied program resources.
Posted as part of Nonprofit Career Month, featuring the diversity of career opportunities in the nonprofit sector.
Today, Tuesday, October 20, as Idealist hosts a Nonprofit Career Fair together with Seattle University, we will also run a live webcast during an accompanying information session, “Connecting Intention to Action. Connecting Action to Career” (1:30-2:30 pm PST).
Meg Busse and Steve Joiner, Directors of the Career Transitions Program here at Idealist, will lead this workshop.
They’ll take a holistic view of the career search by helping participants to:
See themselves and their career paths in a more complex and complete way
Understand several self-assessment tools that will help them articulate their experiences, skills, values, and priorities in a compelling way
Explore the “nuts and bolts” of the nonprofit sector in order to gain a larger view of how they might fit in
Explore ways to create intentional opportunities with organizations by exploring the synergy between their self and sector understanding
This event will also be offered as a free webcast to the first 150 attendees who register.
If you are interested in joining us via the web, here is the log-in information:
To access the presentation, click here.
To call in, dial: 866-740-1260
Enter the code: 2270113
This week, America’s Service Commissions (ASC)—the independent association of state commissions on voluntary action and service—and ServeMinnesota — the Minnesota commission on volunteering and service — have announced the launch a new resource, the AmeriCorps State Program Replication Wiki. 
Today, Tuesday, October 20, as Idealist hosts a Nonprofit Career Fair together with 
The New Service 