Being a VISTA member, in some respects, is really giving yourself up to some degree of chance. I had been lucky enough to find an assignment that interested me in my home town (thus allowing me to live with my dad - though detailing how I actually survive on the living stipend should be a different post), and it seemed as if I could actually affect some change in a measurable manner.
However, I never really knew into what I was throwing myself. Yeah, something about "eradicating poverty" and "domestic peace corps" this and "getting things done" that but those don't necessarily speak to a person's individual work plan. Many of the students that take part in the Manchester 21st CCLC are poor - the most basic requirement for a school to have a 21st CCLC program is that the school needs to be at least 30% free and reduced lunch - but I barely ever see these kids and I only interact with them during events or when I visit one of the programs. Furthermore, my program isn't about eradicating poverty. A quality afterschool program can hope for nothing better than to, perhaps, alleviate the negative effects impoverished environments have on the school lives of a child by fostering positive self image, enabling a stronger social net, and the ability to have that ever important, positive relationship with a non parental adult. In a way, I see it as being all about relationship building, which also seems to be what I am really supposed to be doing.
Subsequently, at my meetings I would tell people what I knew about the program and the 21st CCLC funding stream and ask them how they viewed afterschool programs. It seemed like a good thing to know if a person was on board with the co-curricular, enrichment bandwagon or the afterschool = childcare one. I will admit, however, that, at this point, I wasn't the most knowledgeable about the program specifics and at one point in a meeting I was asked how much money the program would require to be sustainable. Simply put, I didn't know and this person called my site director. Well this lead to my site director and I talking about this situation and she wanted to know what I was telling people and what I was asking them and what my intentions were with that knowledge. I didn't really know what to say to her and I probably wasn't the most articulate but the situation really left me feeling entirely untrusted. It seemed to me that my site director wanted me to go out and meet everybody that she can't, due to time constraints, but still be the one talking to these people.
This was my first experience with some troubled seas at my host site. I suddenly felt like I couldn't (rather shouldn't) go do anything out in the community. I stopped making appointments and tried to figure out what happened. Basically, what it sort of boils down to, is that I was not taking into consideration the political climate around me in my meetings with members of the community. This, in turn, caused my site director distress not only because she intensely feared anything coming back to her and creating more work in the form of needing to sort out situations or stopping misinformation, but because she also didn't feel that she had the time to really support me. Furthermore, she didn't want me to be talking to people who knew the program and who would possibly get involved in the sustainability process due to their prior participation. I was supposed to be out in the business world drumming up corporate sponsorship. Frankly, I didn't know how to do that... at all.
So to whom did I turn? PlusTimeNH, my sponsoring agency about a half hour away in Chichester NH. I emailed the person with whom I work closely, since he is directly involved in the sustainability process here at the program and he informed the person in charge of overseeing the VISTAs of PlusTime. We all sat down at a meeting and discussed the situation. When I originally interviewed with my site director, for the position, I was trying to make a good impression and be ready for questions. I had no real time to see what she was like and you can never figure a person out in a half hour anyways. This brings me back to chance. The outcome of the meeting was that my site director and I really get along well now. She respects me and my abilities and I know, more clearly, what is expected of me. Now, that isn't to say that I'm not allowed to do anything - and I think that may happen to many VISTAs. Site directors are busy, they don't have time to support you, and you have no idea what the hell you are supposed to do or from what direction you should attack even if you do. But because I used the resources available to me my work relationships are much improved and I'm also better at what I do.
There is, generally, always somebody to whom you can turn somewhere in this whole VISTA thing.
Thursday, January 3, 2008
Wednesday, January 2, 2008
No program is an island...
My forays out into the nonprofit and business world really taught me a lot very quickly. My program is in Manchester, NH. Basically, Manchester is an urban, immigrant resettlement city in a rural state. NH doesn't have the biggest population and I generally have to tell people in other parts of the country that I live an hour north of Boston for them to understand where I am.
I had been a resident of Manchester my whole life, barring my 4 years at college, and I had gone through the very school system which I am attempting to help. Those experiences gave me a certain credibility (Manchester, it seems to me, is a town where if you run for office and haven't lived in the city your entire life nobody will even notice you), however, I had only seen a small portion of the city. I had no idea that NH has over 7,000 nonprofit agencies, that the political sphere in Manchester was so far reaching and entangling, or that I would be seeing several people from the same organizations so much.
I took notes at every meeting and attempted to draw the links between all the city orgs, nonprofits, and businesses that somehow intersected with my afterschool program. I've met with members of the school district (Federal Projects Manager, Grant Writer, Principals, Fine Arts Director) and directors and employees of programs (Bedford Youth Performing Company, Office of Youth Services, Acting Loft, Makin' It Happen Coalition, Media Power Youth, Child Health Services, Manchester Health Department, Boys and Girls Club, Currier Art Center, the Fisher Cats, Manchester Housing and Redevelopment Authority, Greater Manchester Chamber of Commerce). The oddest part, I thought, was that all these groups were already involved with my program in some way. I believe I've been very lucky at my site seeing how well the program director and I get along and the amount of community orgs that are somehow involved in the program. However, nobody outside those people directly involved with the program really know anything about it.
All and all, I've come to the conclusion that no organization in a community can
1) be a quality program and
2) be sustainable
without making a large splash in that community. It was then that I realized what sustainability really is - sustainability happens when a community realizes it can't live without something.
I had been a resident of Manchester my whole life, barring my 4 years at college, and I had gone through the very school system which I am attempting to help. Those experiences gave me a certain credibility (Manchester, it seems to me, is a town where if you run for office and haven't lived in the city your entire life nobody will even notice you), however, I had only seen a small portion of the city. I had no idea that NH has over 7,000 nonprofit agencies, that the political sphere in Manchester was so far reaching and entangling, or that I would be seeing several people from the same organizations so much.
I took notes at every meeting and attempted to draw the links between all the city orgs, nonprofits, and businesses that somehow intersected with my afterschool program. I've met with members of the school district (Federal Projects Manager, Grant Writer, Principals, Fine Arts Director) and directors and employees of programs (Bedford Youth Performing Company, Office of Youth Services, Acting Loft, Makin' It Happen Coalition, Media Power Youth, Child Health Services, Manchester Health Department, Boys and Girls Club, Currier Art Center, the Fisher Cats, Manchester Housing and Redevelopment Authority, Greater Manchester Chamber of Commerce). The oddest part, I thought, was that all these groups were already involved with my program in some way. I believe I've been very lucky at my site seeing how well the program director and I get along and the amount of community orgs that are somehow involved in the program. However, nobody outside those people directly involved with the program really know anything about it.
All and all, I've come to the conclusion that no organization in a community can
1) be a quality program and
2) be sustainable
without making a large splash in that community. It was then that I realized what sustainability really is - sustainability happens when a community realizes it can't live without something.
Getting to a meeting...
So before I could actually meet with people I had to contact them. And, as a lowly VISTA member, this gave me some trepidation. I really wasn't sure how people would receive me and I wasn't sure the best way to actually explain what I was doing (as in, what the hell is a VISTA?). Because of this I turned to the least frightening media outlet available to me - email. It doesn't work for everybody but given how most of the business world believes it is far too busy to do anything other than what is already in their day planner I find that it cuts down on the amount of phone tag. Most people tend to check their email quite regularly as well.
Two of my previous jobs were sales related and that experience has really aided me as a VISTA. I used to sell credit cards for MBNA America (now purchased by Bank of America) and then I sold Cutco Cutlery for Vector Marketing. Selling knives taught me the importance of face to face meetings, you only do demonstrations in the homes of the people to whom you are trying to sell knives, and selling credit cards really taught me how to deal with rejection and making the most of as little time and words as possible. Both professions rely heavily on both scripted material and the ability to personalize conversations and discussions. With all that in mind, I created a protocol for myself.
First I had to figure out what my ultimate goal was. I'm a firm believer that you can't tell a story unless you know where it's going. Starting at the end, then, can make perfect sense. My goal is to get people on my sustainability subcommittees. In order to do that I need to get a face to face meeting with the person - preferably at his or her place of work because the person will be more comfortable. I chose to contact the "soft hits" first - those people already familiar with the program. The following is what I came up with.
Two of my previous jobs were sales related and that experience has really aided me as a VISTA. I used to sell credit cards for MBNA America (now purchased by Bank of America) and then I sold Cutco Cutlery for Vector Marketing. Selling knives taught me the importance of face to face meetings, you only do demonstrations in the homes of the people to whom you are trying to sell knives, and selling credit cards really taught me how to deal with rejection and making the most of as little time and words as possible. Both professions rely heavily on both scripted material and the ability to personalize conversations and discussions. With all that in mind, I created a protocol for myself.
First I had to figure out what my ultimate goal was. I'm a firm believer that you can't tell a story unless you know where it's going. Starting at the end, then, can make perfect sense. My goal is to get people on my sustainability subcommittees. In order to do that I need to get a face to face meeting with the person - preferably at his or her place of work because the person will be more comfortable. I chose to contact the "soft hits" first - those people already familiar with the program. The following is what I came up with.
1) I got out my list and figured out who the partners of the program are – who provides programming/volunteers/space/food/in-kind donations of any kind on some sort of regular basis – could be a non-profit that teaches a class once a month or a company that donates free tee shirts for a specific event once a year. I had compiled this information with the help of my site director.
2) I then wrote up a form to use for the email which I've generalized here:
a. Hi, my name is (your name) and I’m the (position: for example “new AmeriCorps*
3) I waited for a reply. It really shouldn’t be too hard to get to the meeting this way but I would sometimes encounter a question like “well what do you want to talk about?”
a. A good response could look like: “I would like to hear your perception of the program as a (whatever he/she/they are) and discuss the sustainability plan the program will be moving into. As a (something in the community) I feel it is important to get your feedback on things and include you as possible. (recommend a meeting time, day, or span – “is early next week good?”)
I've found that as long as I make things short and don't give too much information people don't really ask questions until the meeting - which is fine because that's what the meeting is about.Wednesday, December 5, 2007
Getting down to business...
Once I was all settled and had met people and had my desk built and could actually dial both in and out of the office, I turned my attention to getting to know my program. My first full week of work all I did was read and ask questions. I grabbed the original grant for the 9 site program and read the whole thing. I grabbed the original grants for the other two sites (each with its own grant) and read those. I read the entire CIPAS report (still don't know for what it stands but basically they kind of critique your afterschool program and offer "expert insight" into improvements and what is going well) as well as all the materials the program provided the CIPAS team.
Then, after reading hundreds of pages in binders at my desk, I started reading hundreds of pages online at my desk. Since the funding stream for my program came out of the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) act it made sense for me to learn about the damn thing. Then I read about the 21st Century Community Learning Centers itself and about how the funding has been stunted (at one point it was actually reduced) even though NCLB contains numbers for the amount of dollars to be earmarked each successive year. After that I began reading about federal grant opportunities. CCDF grants, TANF funds, DOJ grants, the Federal Projects Titles I-V, even the CDC, Staples, and LEGO have grants out there.
What did I do with all the info that could possibly pertain to the program? Well, I put it in a folder I made. As my first month went by the only section that really had anything in it was the sustainability section. I had found models to use, pdf files pertaining specifically to 21st CCLC sites, lists pertaining to NH grants and even smaller, Manchester only grants for which the program could apply.
Another big part of my job is to create databases and track people/funding and events. Well funding, not so much - but people, I'm all over that. I began compiling the names and contact info of every person with whom the program had ever worked. This, of course, was no easy task. Since the program never really had a good administrative assistant (apparently it had one that was mediocre at best and ended up screwing up more stuff) none of this information was really easily attainable. Sure, there were folders from past providers and companies, but I had to take names off of emails and search MOUs (Memorandums of Understanding) for contact people and then use the internet or go back to another email to get contact information. Not that I ever complained. It gave me something to do and I plugged along like a good little VISTA. Eventually I had a bunch of names and, after repeatedly asking Donna "so who was this person?" and "what is our relationship with this person?", I had an inkling of what the program was really doing and with whom it was currently working.
But once I had all these names I didn't really know what I supposed to do with them. Then I looked at my work plan again and I figured it out. In order to "build the capacity" of the program I needed, and still need, to figure out what the teachers, children, parents, and providers think of the program. And, it occurred to me, if I needed to recruit people for sustainability subcommittees why not kill two birds with one stone? That's when I started emailing people...
Then, after reading hundreds of pages in binders at my desk, I started reading hundreds of pages online at my desk. Since the funding stream for my program came out of the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) act it made sense for me to learn about the damn thing. Then I read about the 21st Century Community Learning Centers itself and about how the funding has been stunted (at one point it was actually reduced) even though NCLB contains numbers for the amount of dollars to be earmarked each successive year. After that I began reading about federal grant opportunities. CCDF grants, TANF funds, DOJ grants, the Federal Projects Titles I-V, even the CDC, Staples, and LEGO have grants out there.
What did I do with all the info that could possibly pertain to the program? Well, I put it in a folder I made. As my first month went by the only section that really had anything in it was the sustainability section. I had found models to use, pdf files pertaining specifically to 21st CCLC sites, lists pertaining to NH grants and even smaller, Manchester only grants for which the program could apply.
Another big part of my job is to create databases and track people/funding and events. Well funding, not so much - but people, I'm all over that. I began compiling the names and contact info of every person with whom the program had ever worked. This, of course, was no easy task. Since the program never really had a good administrative assistant (apparently it had one that was mediocre at best and ended up screwing up more stuff) none of this information was really easily attainable. Sure, there were folders from past providers and companies, but I had to take names off of emails and search MOUs (Memorandums of Understanding) for contact people and then use the internet or go back to another email to get contact information. Not that I ever complained. It gave me something to do and I plugged along like a good little VISTA. Eventually I had a bunch of names and, after repeatedly asking Donna "so who was this person?" and "what is our relationship with this person?", I had an inkling of what the program was really doing and with whom it was currently working.
But once I had all these names I didn't really know what I supposed to do with them. Then I looked at my work plan again and I figured it out. In order to "build the capacity" of the program I needed, and still need, to figure out what the teachers, children, parents, and providers think of the program. And, it occurred to me, if I needed to recruit people for sustainability subcommittees why not kill two birds with one stone? That's when I started emailing people...
Wednesday, November 28, 2007
Initial fears and worries...
When I first turned my attention to my work plan I was... pretty frightened. Was I really supposed to get all this stuff done in one year? How was I, a 22 year old just out a college (with a B.A. in music performance and philosophy) supposed to get corporate sponsorship for an afterschool program as well as partner with sports teams and facilitate meetings? Basically, I realized that I didn't actually have to do that stuff. My job, as the first year VISTA, is to set in motion what needs to be set in motion to start the relationships that could eventually turn into corporate sponsorship and partnering with sports teams. Here I was thinking that I had to write a hundred grants to come up with hundreds of thousands of dollars to keep this program running when all I am really supposed to do is increase who knows about the program.
I looked at my VAD and suddenly understood that I don't have to get money from people - though it would be great if I did - all I have to do is increase awareness of the program. That is actually what my year of service is all about. I just need to get people involved and the get the program out into the community. Now, facilitating meetings... that's something that I do actually need to do and I worried about it. I had lead discussions in classes and small groups in college and I'm not afraid to do public speaking, but I won't really know the people there that much and, perhaps most importantly, I don't know what they think of me.
I'm just a lowly AmeriCorps*VISTA member. Most people don't even know what that is. The often unknown status of my job title combined with my age and, to some extent, inexperience, is something that I still see as an inhibitor to my success. Why should the Executive Director of such and such program meet with me? I'm just a guy trying to do some good stuff for kids... well, as it turns out that is exactly why. I'm a youth with some dedication, vision, passion, and work ethic to get things done. I've found that many people actually enjoy talking to me and hearing about what my goals are for the year and what I have been tasked to do. Sure, every now and again I get self conscious and it's really hard to stay afloat under the sheer weight of what I'm attempting to do - but as long as you keep moving forward you find that things get done. The AmeriCorps oath, which I think is both the silliest thing ever and perhaps the most appropriate statement, is that "I do affirm that I will get things done." In some respect, as long as I do something that is beneficial for the program that ends up helping some kids, I can sleep in the bed I've made.
I looked at my VAD and suddenly understood that I don't have to get money from people - though it would be great if I did - all I have to do is increase awareness of the program. That is actually what my year of service is all about. I just need to get people involved and the get the program out into the community. Now, facilitating meetings... that's something that I do actually need to do and I worried about it. I had lead discussions in classes and small groups in college and I'm not afraid to do public speaking, but I won't really know the people there that much and, perhaps most importantly, I don't know what they think of me.
I'm just a lowly AmeriCorps*VISTA member. Most people don't even know what that is. The often unknown status of my job title combined with my age and, to some extent, inexperience, is something that I still see as an inhibitor to my success. Why should the Executive Director of such and such program meet with me? I'm just a guy trying to do some good stuff for kids... well, as it turns out that is exactly why. I'm a youth with some dedication, vision, passion, and work ethic to get things done. I've found that many people actually enjoy talking to me and hearing about what my goals are for the year and what I have been tasked to do. Sure, every now and again I get self conscious and it's really hard to stay afloat under the sheer weight of what I'm attempting to do - but as long as you keep moving forward you find that things get done. The AmeriCorps oath, which I think is both the silliest thing ever and perhaps the most appropriate statement, is that "I do affirm that I will get things done." In some respect, as long as I do something that is beneficial for the program that ends up helping some kids, I can sleep in the bed I've made.
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