IDK shit about AmeriCorps. Anyone got the lowdown on them?
The actual org I’d be working with is an anti-homelessness org in my city. The pay is super low and they were transparent in saying “yeah a lot of the people that work with us have other jobs” but after 2 years of hardly any income, and a chance at a job where I’d actually be helping people, I’d take it in a second.
Guess what I’m looking for here, is “is there anything shitty about AmeriCorps I should know if they offer me a job?”
I did two years, working in elementary schools. The pay is super low, we would always joke that we were “AmeriPoor”. The work was very “scabby”. Like, I’m pretty sure a lot of what I did probably should have been done by a unionized paraeducator, but idk. The big benefits for me were paying off a chunk of my student loans, and meeting cool people from all over the country. It gave me an excuse to move to the midwest for a year. I spent both years in large programs, with people who moved from all over to do it. We were all a bunch of 20-somethings far away from home, often in big houses with a bunch of our coworkers, so it was a pretty fun post-college environment. Lots of parties and hooking up and all sorts of drama I’m too old for now.
There were a couple older people in my programs too. I wonder what their experience was.
The best part is the monthly service projects. I mostly taught little kids how to read, but once a month the whole team would get together and we would do some cool community service stuff. I once helped build a playground, and I got to use a jackhammer to help break down pavement.