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Topics:
Youth
By
the People:
Citizenship Training in AmeriCorps
Manual
Index
Preface
Introduction: The Guide
Format and the Goals of AmeriCorps
Chapter One: The Framework:
Democracy, Citizenship, Politics and Service
Chapter Two: Encouraging (Civic) Responsibility
Chapter Three: Strengthening Community
(Capacity)
Chapter Four: Getting Things
Done
Chapter
Five: Expanding Opportunity
Resources:
Glossary, Bibliography, Other
Contents
Chapter
Five: Expanding Opportunity
Chapter
5: Expanding Opportunity
Citizenship and Service as a Life-long Learning Process
AmeriCorps
reflects the basic American idea of reciprocity: when you give
something great to your country, you ought to get something
back in return. . . . [The] experience of AmeriCorps can expand
your options in many ways, providing priceless life- and job-skills.
You can emerge from AmeriCorps knowing how to teach or to build—and
carry these skills through the rest of your life.
- AmeriCorps Member Handbook
While getting
things done is a prime value of AmeriCorps, solving particular
problems is only part of a much larger picture. Expanding opportunity
is a process of education that allows you to actualize your potential.
Of perhaps greatest importance is what you, and the members of
the community in which you work, learn through doing the work
of citizenship: what you learn about yourselves, your capacities,
and the potential of ordinary citizens to impact the world. This
will be the true legacy of AmeriCorps.
Two important
ways to make active citizenship a process of individual and collective
education include evaluation and civic storytelling.
Civic
Skill: Evaluation
Evaluation
is a critical component of expanding opportunity. It requires
that you think about what you've done, about what you've learned,
and about what you need to do next. Most of the time, people think
of evaluating only at the very end of a project. However, for
evaluation to be most useful, you need to do it every step of
the way—as you are exploring your interests, building relationships,
defining problems, devising solutions, creating strategies, and
taking action.
Such a focus
on ongoing evaluation is often dismissed as a waste of time, time
that could better be used to just get things done. Actually, evaluation
can help you save time and increase your opportunity to more effectively
and efficiently accomplish your goals.
Evaluation
will help you:
- Avoid
misunderstandings and resolve conflict;
- Encourage
everyone to participate;
- Clarify
roles and create accountability;
- Verbalize
what is working and what is not;
- Gain a
sense of what you are accomplishing and learning; and
- Know what
you need to do differently and what you need to do next.
Much of
the preparatory work for service projects takes place in meetings.
Evaluating these meetings is a good way to begin to build evaluation
into your work.
Sample
Questions For Evaluating Meetings
- What did
we set out to accomplish during our time together? What did
we accomplish? What decisions did we make? What roles did people
take?
- What did
we do well today? What didn't go well? What should we do differently
next time?
- What did
we learn about self- interest? public life? diversity? power?
How can we use what we have learned?
- What is
our next step? What decisions do we need to make? What roles
do people need to take?
- What items
do we need to put on our next meeting agenda? What did we not
finish today? What new issues will we need to address?
As you and
your colleagues begin to implement your strategies for addressing
community problems, evaluation will help you gauge your effectiveness
and learn from your experience.
Sample
Questions For Evaluating Strategies and Action
- What did
we set out to accomplish? What did we accomplish?
- What parts
of our strategy or action worked well? What went as planned?
Were there any pleasant surprises? How can we build on our successes?
- What parts
of our strategy or action didn't work well? What went wrong?
What do we need to change to meet these challenges?
- What did
we learn by taking this action? How can we use this in the future?
Exercise
Worksheet: What We've Done, What We've Learned
This exercise
asks you to: Evaluate a particular aspect of your citizenship
and service work.
It helps
to expand opportunity because: Evaluation is a key to learning
from your experiences and enables you to translate what you've
done in one situation to fit another. When you are able to transfer
skills and understanding you can take advantage of, and create,
diverse opportunities for yourself and others.
Instructions
As a group, answer the following questions after you have finished
a meeting or completed a task. Time limit: 10 minutes.
Evaluation
- What were
we trying to accomplish?
- What did
we accomplish?
- What did
we do well?
- What did
we not do well?
- What do
we need to do differently next time?
- What do
we need to do next, or next time?
Civic
Skill: Civic Storytelling
Evaluation
is one way for individuals and working groups to learn from their
experiences, but it is not the only way. And what about communities,
future AmeriCorps members, future generations? How will they learn
from your work?
In part,
your citizenship and service work will speak for itself through
its lasting effects. On the other hand, America today is a radically
forgetful society. In the past, communities and cultures passed
on their values and sustained themselves by telling stories—personal
stories like those discussed in Chapter 2, as well as civic stories.
The loss of civic stories, stories about how people work together,
contributes to the thinning of the idea of civic work, and the
narrowing of the opportunities it brings. Recovering the art of
civic storytelling creates a collective, active history that informs
the future.
Civic storytelling
can take many forms: written documents, oral narratives, drama,
videos, murals, or songs and rap.
Tips
For Civic Storytelling
- Find past
civic stories connected to your work or institution. What have
others done to address public problems? Recovering lost stories
is as important as creating new ones.
- Keep a
journal of your work. You can even think of it as an ongoing
story. Who are the main characters? What is the setting? What
are people doing and why? What lessons are they learning?
- Work together.
Combining your insights with others' will yield a richer, collective
story.
- Pass it
on. To prevent your story from getting lost, put it on paper
or tape. Then be sure to share and explain it before you move
on to future work.
Exercise
Worksheet: Creating History
This exercise
asks you to: Work with others to create a civic story about your
AmeriCorps service.
It helps
to expand opportunity because: Explaining the lessons of your
work reinforces them for you and passes them on to others—it
is an integral part of the learning process.
Instructions
As a group,
answer the following questions. Time limit: 15 minutes. Then use
this information to create a civic story in the format of your
choice. Time limit: 30 minutes. When you are finished, share your
stories with others.
Questions
- If you
were to look at your AmeriCorps work as an ongoing story, who
are the main characters?
- What is
the setting?
- What have
been the major plot points?
- What have
been the points of conflict?
- How have
these conflicts been resolved?
- What is
the "moral" of the story? What lessons have you learned?
Manual
Index
Preface
Introduction: The Guide
Format and the Goals of AmeriCorps
Chapter One: The Framework:
Democracy, Citizenship, Politics and Service
Chapter Two: Encouraging (Civic) Responsibility
Chapter Three: Strengthening Community
(Capacity)
Chapter Four: Getting Things
Done
Chapter
Five: Expanding Opportunity
Resources:
Glossary, Bibliography, Other
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