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My first term of AmeriCorps service, working on
literacy skills with kids in a HeadStart classroom enabled me to
discover my passion for fairness and social justice. It led to
my decision to go to grad school. My second term of
AmeriCorps service enable me to finish my degree and gain
valuable skills and experience. It also stretched me in ways
that I may not have challenged myself on my own.
Discovering that service is truly a reciprocal
act, I found that I take away as much as I give, and sometimes,
a little more. Within the course of service,
experience teaches us, yet it is not always what we wanted to
learn. Oftentimes, however, it is what we needed to learn
most.
It was choosing to embrace my service that I
was able to see the stories unfolding all around me. Professors
took on the work of challenging their student to transform their
classroom learning through a service experience. Students
partnered with the community in designing computer systems,
counseling local high school youth, creating a watershed plan to
maintain local bodies of water and providing a festival where
all cultures shared food, music, traditions and communicated
with each other with civility and without fear.
I realized that my service is not about me,
but about what can be facilitated through me. I am but one piece
where each piece builds upon the other. Thank you
AmeriCorps and those who allowed me to serve and for the chance
to learn this truth.
-- Nikki, 2007 Minnesota AmeriCorps Member |
