I know, I know. Why get off our butts? We like sitting there. It’s the perfect position to try to turn EB3’s latest bulletin on State House wives into a screenplay (Eva Longoria as Ms. Petro?)
But you, yes you, can start a Commonwealth Corps operation. Even Republicans! Well, I’m not sure about that, but probably.
I’m not in any way affiliated with CC, but it’s modeled on AmeriCorps, and I am involved with an AmeriCorps team of tutors that works in 4 Boston schools.
The details are myraid. Here’s a simplified version. You could help a nonprofit snag a team of 3 to 15 full-time volunteers for a year at a pop.
Instead of your next 500 word blog about Reverend Wright, you could help someone write an application, due at the end of June.
The CCers get a stipend of about $10,000, which is supposed to cover Ramen noodles while either they live in Mom’s basement or share an Allston* studio with 9 other people.
(Early on in AmeriCorps history, there was some consternation about whether a stipend made it not count as “volunteer,” but now the program has a constituency on both sides.)
CC is supposed to do 2 things. First, improve the community (ie, the people who get the service, whether kids, seniors, etc) through direct service (tutoring, etc). Second, improve the lives of the people (often recent college grads) who do the service.
If you play your cards right, there are a LOT of young people out there who want to serve. Our program gets 600 apps for about 50 slots.
*Peter P: please insert equivalent for Cape Cod housing
Do you need to be an official (for tax purposes) non-profit? OpenMass.org could use a couple of volunteers…
I don’t know the answer. But they have information sessions coming up. Plus there’s a lot of info on the website that I linked to.
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p>What you might be able to do is partner with an existing nonprofit….perhaps one of the smaller ones working on “digital divide” issues….
Try to spend the summer within Nickerson State Park, moving like gypsies from campsite to campsite, hoping it doesn’t rain too hard…