Recruiting Candidates for AmeriCorps VISTA placement in 2015-16!

NC Campus Compact is recruiting candidates for our AmeriCorps VISTA program. Successful candidates will begin one year of VISTA service in early August 2015. Positions are filled on a rolling basis so candidates are encouraged to apply early. All selections will be made by early June.

Our program places VISTA members at community and campus host sites to create or expand programs that leverage higher education resources to assist low-income communities. While the specific nature and objectives of projects vary depending on the host site, each VISTA placement will help address local needs in one of three ways:

• improving education for low-income K-12 students
• creating economic opportunity (especially job training or financial literacy) for low-income adults, OR
• advancing food security/healthy eating in low-income communities.

A year of VISTA service is a great way for young people to gain experience in non-profit and higher ed community engagement and to develop skills in program and volunteer management, event planning, community organizing, and partnership building. The best candidates have background and prior leadership in community service and a passion for reducing poverty.

FAQs for Prospective VISTAs

VISTA VIEW Blog 

For more information, contact VISTA Leader Catherine Casteel. 

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Recent Stories on the NC Campus Compact Newsfeed

New issue of Partnerships examines challenge of teaching democratic thinking

NC mayors join day of recognition for national service

Campus Compact recognizes 3 NC students as Newman Civic Fellows

• The Pathways Out of Poverty program supports statewide, regional, or national initiatives to nurture systemic change in the educational, economic, and community systems that produce and perpetuate poverty in the U.S.
• The Civil Society program seeks to strengthen philanthropy and the nonprofit sector as vital vehicles for increasing civic engagement and improving communities and societies in the U.S. and internationally. 
• The Environment program promotes activities that protect the diversity and integrity of selected ecosystems in North America and around the world. 

 Youth4Education 2015-16 Lead Activist Grants 

Deadline: May 20  
 

NYLC's Youth4Education grant program will assist 22 Lead Activists, ages 15-21, to use their passion to take action and to ensure that all youth have an equal chance at tomorrow. Grant recipients will receive:  

• Summer leadership training, July 9 - 14, 2015, that challenges recipients to lead service-learning projects that address educational inequity in their school communities throughout the 2015-16 school year. Grant includes travel to and from the Audubon Center of the North Woods, Sandstone, MN.
• Year-long support to implement your project including up to $500 financial support.
• Recognition as a leader in education equity.
• Total grant value is $3,000 per Lead Activist.

Youth4Education is a youth solution to end educational inequity.   

2015-2016 National Child Awareness Month Youth Ambassador Program

Deadline: June 10

This is a year-long program for young leaders ages 16-22 to create change around issues facing youth today.  Fifty-one NCAM Youth Ambassadors will be selected - one per state + DC. Ambassadors receive a $1,000 grant, an all-expense paid, three-day leadership training in September 2015 in Washington, DC, and ongoing training and networking opportunities.

2015 Pedro Zamora Young Leaders Scholarship 

Deadline: June 15

Dedicated to the continuing legacy of AIDS educator and activist Pedro Zamora, this Scholarship Program (Scholarship) seeks to support the academic efforts of emerging young leaders who share Pedro's passionate commitment to ending the HIV/AIDS pandemic.

The Scholarship is open to all current high school seniors, and college freshman, sophomores and juniors (ages 27 and younger) who demonstrate an active commitment to fighting AIDS and taking on roles of public service and leadership (e.g. providing peer-based prevention and education; engaging in advocacy or grass-roots activism; raising public awareness; and/or delivering practical, emotional or treatment support to people living with HIV/AIDS), and who plan to continue to find ways to make a difference in the epidemic through their careers or through public service opportunities after their education is complete.

Scholarships range from $2,500 to $5,000.

Opportunity for institutions to Host a Vote Everywhere Student Ambassador 

The Andrew Goodman Foundation is seeking partner universities for their Vote Everywhere program   Selected schools will appoint a "Campus Champion" who selects and mentors "Ambassadors" who receive training, support and resources from the Foundation in addition to a $1000 scholarship and $500 activities budget to engage in voter registration, education and get out the vote as well as social justice projects. 

Interested?  Contact Sylvia Golbin. 

Ernest A. Lynton Award for the Scholarship of Engagement for Early Career Faculty  

Nomination deadline: May 15

The award recognizes a full-time faculty member who is pre-tenure at tenure-granting campuses or early career (i.e., within the first six years) at campuses with long-term contracts, and who connects his or her teaching, research, and service to community engagement. 

Thomas Ehrlich Civically Engaged Faculty Award

Nomination Deadline: May 22 
(For Campus Compact member institutions) 

The award recognizes senior, tenured faculty for exemplary leadership in advancing students' civic learning and higher education's contributions to the public good, including teaching with engaged pedagogies, fostering reciprocal community partnerships, building institutional support for service-learning and civic engagement, conducting community-based research, and other means of acting on individual and institutional civic commitments.

The Jill Friedman Fixler Professional Development Scholarship
Application deadline: May 29
 

This professional development scholarship is provided by Points of Light and will be awarded to one volunteer manager or volunteer leader in memory of Jill Friedman Fixler. Jill dedicated her career to shifting the field from traditional volunteer management to a culture of more robust and meaningful volunteer engagement. Jill was a Director of Volunteer Services at multiple organizations before becoming a successful consultant to organizations throughout the US and Canada.

Since Jill trained, mentored, collaborated with and coached so many professionals in the field, we dedicate this scholarship to her to carry her legacy forward.

Click here to learn more about Jill on the Points of Light blog.

Applications will be reviewed by a panel of volunteer engagement leaders and applicants will be notified by Points of Light by end of June.

About the Application:

• In 1000 characters or less, please articulate your commitment to the field of volunteer engagement.
• In 1000 characters of less, what or who inspires you to volunteer and/or engage others in service?
• In 1000 characters or less, please demonstrate your financial need in attending the National Conference on Volunteering and Service.

Benefits:

• Free Conference for Volunteering and Service Registration (value of $450)
• Travel reimbursement in accordance with POL policies up to $1,500

International Association for Research on Service-Learning and Community Engagement (IARSLCE) Awards

Nomination deadline: June 12 

The Distinguished Career Recognition - acknowledges and celebrates intellectual leadership through a body of work that has broad and deep impact on service-learning and community engagement-including the study of it, the practice of it, and the cultures and systems within which it is undertaken.

The Early Career Recognition - acknowledges and celebrates intellectual leadership through an emerging body of work that has begun to demonstrate broad and deep impact on service-learning and community engagement - including the study of it, the practice of it, and the cultures and/or systems within which it is undertaken.

The Dissertation Recognition - acknowledges and celebrates a dissertation that advances research on service-learning and community engagement through rigorous and innovative inquiry and has the potential for impact - including on the study of it, the practice of it, and/or the cultures and systems within which it is undertaken.

The Community-Engaged Research Team Recognition - acknowledges and celebrates the scholarly contributions of teams, in which community members are co-researchers with scholars in educational institutions, that both (a) demonstrate the potential for impact on service-learning and community engagement - including on the study of it, the practice of it, and/or the cultures and systems within which it is undertaken - and (b) model a high standard of reciprocity in the inquiry process and in the implementation of the partnership.

Graduate Student Scholarships ($500) - provided to support the participation of 10 graduate students the 2015 IARSLCE Conference in Boston, MA. Scholarship recipients fall into two categories: (a) early graduate students and (b) advanced graduate students. A total of ten scholarships will be awarded across the two categories. Within each category, at least one scholarship will be awarded to an international graduate student based outside the US.

Twelve North Carolina Schools were included in the list and two made the "Top 50 Green Colleges" list. Eleven are NC Campus Compact members.

Warren Wilson College -  #17

UNC Chapel Hill - #31

Other NC institutions

• Appalachian State
• Catawba College
• Davidson College
• Duke University
• Elon University
• Guilford College 
• NC State
• UNC Charlotte
• UNC Greensboro
• Western Carolina University

Michigan Journal of Community Service Learning (MJCSL) 
 Volume 21 number 2 

Both the fall and current spring issues comprise volume 21 The fall issue contained a special section on global service-learning (GSL) guest co-edited by Richard Kiely (Cornell University) and Eric Hartman (Kansas State University). A second special section on GSL will appear in volume 22 number 1 to be released fall 2015.

Volume 21 Number 2 includes the following articles:

Research, Theory, & Evaluation

• Development of the Community Impact Scale Measuring Community Organization Perceptions of Partnership Benefits and Costs Tejaswinhi Srinivas, Chelsea E. Meenan, Elizabeth Drogin and Anne P. DePrince
• The Effect of Community Service Learning on Undergraduate Persistence in Three Institutional Contexts Susan C. Reed, Helen Rosenberg, Anne Statham and Howard Rosing Faculty
• Use of Community-Based Learning: What Factors Really Matter?
  Melinda Russell-Stamp
• Reflective Practice that Persists: Connections Between Reflection in Service-Learning Programs and in Current LifeTania D. Mitchell, F. Dan Richard, Richard M. Battistoni, Colleen Rost-Banik, Rebecca Netz and Catherine Zakoske 

Pedagogy

John Dewey's Pragmatism: Implications for Reflection in Service-Learning

Harry Clark Maddux and Deborah Donnett

Book Review Essays

• Learning in the Plural: Essays on the Humanities and Public Life (David D. Cooper)Reviewed by Nora Bacon
• Service-Learning Essentials: Questions, Answers, and Lessons Learned (Barbara Jacoby)Reviewed by Lina D. Dostilio

The yearly subscription rate for Volume 21 which includes both the Fall and Spring issues is $29.00. 

Subscribe here.  All past issues of the MJCSL may be downloaded for free from this same Web site (other than the most recent issues which are embargoed for a year).

National 

In the recently released Routledge Handbook of Poverty in the United States, national Campus Compact President Andrew Seligsohn co-authored the chapter "Deindustrialized Small Cities and Poverty: The View from Camden" with Joan Maya Mazelis, Assistant Professor of Sociology at Rutgers-Camden. 
 

In the chapter, written during Seligsohn's tenure as the Associate Chancellor of Civic Engagement and Strategic Planning at Rutgers-Camden, he and Mazelis examine the impact on democracy and civic life of the economic collapse of small cities.

Relevant Articles 

• Leo Lambert (Burlington-Times New op-ed) "What stands to be lost in sales tax bill"  

Clemson Collaborations in Service-Learning  

"Memory Health: Caring for Self, Caring for Others"

May 13 (3:30 p.m.)

Dr. Cheryl Dye discusses how she has created a nexus between her work as a public health professor teaching a course in older adult health, mentoring undergraduate students in a multi-semester Creative Inquiry project, and conducting research in collaboration with a hospital memory health program to promote the cognitive health of those with dementia and their caregivers. 

Nonprofit VOTE webinar (FREE)

"Getting Started: Nonpartisan Voter Engagement for Nonprofits"

May 14 (2:00 p.m.)  
 

This introduction to nonprofit voter engagement work covers the basics--voter registration, voter education, candidate engagement, ballot measure advocacy, get-out-the-vote efforts, and staying nonpartisan--while focusing on how to integrate these activities into services you already provide.

Featured Presenters: Erika Anthony, Senior Director of Advocacy, Policy & Research at Cleveland Neighborhood Progress and Lindsey Hodel, National Field Director at Nonprofit VOTE. 

Advancing Research Webinar Series (FREE but space is limited)

Five Distinctive Components of Global Service-Learning: Framing a Research Agenda

presented by Eric Hartman and Richard Kiely
May 19, 2015 (1:00 p.m.) 
 

During this webinar, presenters Dr. Eric Hartman and Dr. Richard Kiely will share their understanding of the distinctive characteristics of the field of global service-learning, clarify the theoretical roots of these distinctive characteristics, and share reflection regarding promising opportunities for current and future research. This webinar will draw on the presenters' considerable research, facilitation, and field-building specific to global service-learning. Hartman and Kiely have led pre-conference sessions on global service-learning for IARSLCE annually since 2011, recently served as guest co-editors for the first and second (current) Michigan Journal of Community Service-Learning special sections on global service-learning, and co-founded the field-gathering website, globalsl.org. Independently, together, and with other co-authors, they have authored more than 20 articles and chapters on global service-learning, including pieces focusing both on community development and student learning. Ample space for dialogue and discussion on the field of global service-learning will be part of the webinar.

Dr. Eric Hartman is an Assistant Professor of Leadership Studies at Kansas State University. 

Dr. Richard Kiely currently serves as the Director of the Center for Engaged Learning + Research at Cornell University. 

Click here to reserve your space. A weblink will be provided via email the day before the webinar.

2015 National Conference on Citizenship

"Civic Innovations in Action"
October 9, 2015, Washington, DC

Early registration deadline - June 30th

In-depth sessions will focus on increasing service years, strengthening Civic Health Initiatives, expanding civic education, and encouraging corporate citizenship.