AmeriCorps Vista and Promise Fellows Make a Big Impact in One Short Year

It was for a good cause, after all, helping a young camper get the confidence to show off her singing voice at the talent show during the National Youth Leadership Training. “And so,” says AmeriCorps Promise Fellow Irina Vaynerman, “that’s how I found myself on stage in a sequined mermaid costume dancing around in my Chacos to the Little Mermaid’s ‘Part of Your World.’”

AmeriCorps Vista and Promise Fellows provide organizations with more than additional project capacity; they bring skills, new research, and fresh perspective to the work. The three AmeriCorps hosted by National Youth Leadership Council during 2010-2011 have contributed great work during the past year, particularly toward understanding and resolving the educational achievement gap.

Lana Peterson, an AmeriCorps Promise Fellow from Duluth, Minn., spent a good part of her year traveling to schools throughout Minnesota and to North Carolina, Illinois, and Louisiana. She facilitated or co-facilitated more than 28 trainings/webinars throughout the year reaching more than 750 attendees, and developed new tools for teachers to plan service-learning.

Peterson says that other highlights of the year included working with NYLC’s Youth Advisory Council’s Professional Development Committee, strengthening relationships with teachers and schools in Minneapolis, and her first presentation at a national conference. She was also able to apply her interest in photography as an unofficial photographer/paparazzi for the National Service-Learning Conference and National Youth Leadership Training events. Peterson will be continuing her work on professional development with NYLC in the coming year, with an eye on new opportunities with video on the internet.

The biggest focus of Vaynerman’s year was revamping NYLC’s achievement gap initiative and training materials NYLC uses to engage youth in discussions about and solutions to the achievement gap. NYLC piloted the new program with campers during this year’s NYLT. For Vaynerman, the experience of helping to plan NYLT and working with camp participants was a validation of the months of research and writing that went into the material.

“I think that sometimes I become so invested in the designing, writing, and editing process that I don’t have the opportunity to see these activities and trainings do their magic,” she said. “But being able to observe the activities and youth reactions to participating in the training that remind me of the importance of this work and the meaningful, tangible impact it can have on youth.” Vaynerman is going on to law school this fall aiming for a career in civil rights/civil liberties work.

Sam Schultz is an AmeriCorps Vista who started with NYLC’s development department, where he helped secure more than $30,000 in individual giving through the launch of the Kielsmeier Leadership Fund and in new alumni giving. He was an organizer for the first NYLT Camp Reunion as well as a key contact for the Youth Advisory Council’s Sustainability Committee. During the year he wrote stories for the NYLC.org website, recruited alumni using social media strategies, crafted annual fund appeal letters, and served as an active organizer for the National Service-Learning Conference. Schultz will be continuing with NYLC as the new Marketing Associate, a position he calls his “dream job.” “It’s perfect,” he said, “I get to use my sociology degree and love for marketing to promote a mission-driven organization whose work I love.”