About the Opportunity
826 Boston seeks mission-driven change-makers to join the Writers’ Room Fellowship as AmeriCorps Members for the 2019-2020 school year. 826 Boston is rapidly expanding to serve more students in the Boston Public Schools through its innovative Writers’ Room Program. This is an exciting opportunity to join the inaugural cohort of 10-15 AmeriCorps members during a time of growth and play a key role in driving impact.
Serving as an AmeriCorps Community Engagement Specialist in the Writers’ Room Fellowship is a challenging yet rewarding experience. You will be part of a five-member team, including the Volunteer Manager, Community Engagement Coordinator, and three AmeriCorps Community Engagement Specialists. Your role is designed to affect individual students and school-wide systems. Through your year of service, you will work with students to empower them to find their voices, tell their stories, and gain critical communication skills while also recruiting, training, and supporting the corps of 500 community volunteer tutors in Writers’ Rooms across Boston.
AmeriCorps Community Engagement Specialists will serve out of 826 Boston’s writing and tutoring center, located at at 3035 Washington Street, Roxbury. Additionally, AmeriCorps Community Engagement Specialists will travel to two of the 826 Boston Writers’ Rooms located in a Boston Public Schools on a weekly basis to serve directly with students. The Writers’ Room Fellowship is an 11-month service program, beginning on Monday, August 5, 2019.
Key Responsibilities and Functions
Writers’ Room Volunteer Coordination
- Support volunteer management, including attending recruitment events, creating volunteer email campaigns, and co-facilitating new volunteer trainings
- Support Writers’ Room program teams by planning tutor debriefs
- Develop and co-lead supplemental training for volunteer tutors
- Oversee on-boarding of service-learning partners within universities and collaborate with faculty and students to enrich 826 Boston Writers’ Rooms
- Coordinate a series of volunteer appreciation initiatives, including social media campaigns, monthly newsletters, and in-person celebrations
- Support Volunteer Manager with engagement of Volunteer Advisory Board to develop volunteer management best practices
- Support Volunteer Manager with cultivation and stewardship of potential corporate partners, with a specific focus on engaging more STEM professionals in Writers’ Rooms
- Communicate project progress to staff supervisor and seek counsel when help is needed to execute goals
Student Direct Service
- Serve as writing tutor to students seeking support with writing assignments in 826 Boston Writers’ Rooms through class visits, individual drop-ins, writing workshops, and publication projects
- Support students’ writing development through one-on-one conferences, small-group collaboration, and whole-class instruction of creative and professional writing and reading workshops
Qualifications
- High school diploma
- Interest in teaching/tutoring writing to students grades K-12 in an urban setting
- Desire to work with and support volunteers from diverse backgrounds and wide ranges of experience
- Ability to coach and mentor volunteers and interns
- Ability to adapt to various working and management styles
- Ability to participate in open communication to build community and foster team goals including the advancement of diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives
- Strong written and verbal communication skills
- Proficiency in organizational, time management, project management, and resource management skills
- Proficiency in Microsoft Office and Google Apps
- Proficiency in Cape Verdean Creole, Haitian Creole, Arabic, or Spanish preferred, but not required
- Familiarity with the Boston Public Schools system, particularly the schools in Roxbury, Dorchester, and Jamaica Plain preferred, but not required
Compensation and Benefits
- Professional Development: As an AmeriCorps Community Engagement Specialist, you will build upon your personal strengths and develop transferable skills, such as teamwork, leadership, decision-making, project management and relationship development. You will develop your knowledge of school and community partnerships, cross-sector collaboration, and the day-to-day operations of a nonprofit organization. 826 Boston provides AmeriCorps Members with formal onboarding in the summer, ongoing training throughout the year, and individualized coaching from a direct supervisor.
- Living Stipend: AmeriCorps Community Engagement Specialists will receive a gross bi-weekly stipend of $538.15, totaling a maximum of $13,992 annually.
- Education Award: As an AmeriCorps Member, Community Engagement Specialists qualify for an Eli Segal Education Award of $5,920 for every successful year of service, which includes completing 1,700 hours of service and completing the full duration of the 11-month program. The education award can be used to repay student loans or cover tuition costs for graduate studies at an accredited college or university.
- Additional Benefits:
- Travel Stipend: $70/month travel stipend for months of active service
- Medical Coverage: AmeriCorps members have the opportunity to request reimbursement of up to $50/month to cover individual health coverage premiums. All AmeriCorps members are eligible for this reimbursement but may decline it in favor of alternative coverage obtained through a parent, guardian, or spouse.
- Time Off: 80 hours of sick time and 80 hours of vacation time
- Public Benefits: AmeriCorps Members may be eligible for food and public utility benefits.
About 826 Boston
826 Boston is a nonprofit youth writing and publishing organization located in Roxbury, Massachusetts, that empowers traditionally underserved students ages 6-18 to find their voices, tell their stories, and gain communication skills to succeed in school and in life. Our high-impact programs are based on the understanding that great leaps in learning can occur with individualized attention, and that writing skills are fundamental to future success.
826 Boston is part of a national network of youth writing centers, founded by the award-winning author Dave Eggers and the educator Nínive Calegari, which was voted one of the top 30 companies to work for by Good Magazine. Since opening in 2007, 826 Boston has delivered its free youth writing and tutoring programs to more than 25,000 students and has been recognized by The Boston Globe as one of the best places in the city to volunteer. 826 Boston’s youth writers have published their work in The New York Times, The Boston Globe, and in numerous award-winning 826 Boston books, including A Place for Me in the World, which was hailed as a “triumph of middle school education” by The Boston Globe. In 2014, the 826 network garnered the American Literacy Prize from the Library of Congress for its pioneering work to eradicate illiteracy in the United States.