Thinking about joining AmeriCorps NCCC and want to know what your year may look like? Hopefully I can give you an idea by breaking down my second year in NCCC in the North Central Region.
Program Overview
Already know about the program? Click HERE to skip to the breakdown.
There is a lot to this program. If you are not familiar with NCCC, here is some information you may need to know in order for everything to make sense.
What is AmeriCorps NCCC
AmeriCorps NCCC (National Civilian Community Corps) is a team-based, residential program for men and women between the ages of 18 and 26 to dedicate 10-11 months of their lives to national and community service. It is also referred to as "Traditional" Corps and one of the four main corps programs of Americorps.
What to know about the North Central Region
The USA is divided into four sections to create the 4 regions of NCCC: Pacific, North Central, Southwest, and Southern. The teams and members belonging to each region will travel around the states within their region for service work. The North Central region's home base is located in Vinton, Iowa. As of 2024 this region is assigned the following states; Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, North Dakota, Nebraska, New Hampshire, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Dakota, Vermont, and Wisconsin.
This region currently sends their team on 3 different rounds throughout the year. (Note: when I was in the program, there were 4 rounds.) You can think of a round as the length of time you will be sent on a project before returning to home base. It is possible to have more than one project during a round.
How to apply to the North Central Region
While you many not be able to directly apply to the campus you want to serve at, each campus welcomes its members at different points of the year. To get assigned the North Central Region, you will need to apply in the summer/fall for a winter start term as the service year takes place from Jan/Feb through November.
To qualify to become a team leader, you must be a minimum of 18 years or older and apply between June and September. The earlier the better as there are a lot fewer TL positions. To qualify to become a corps member you need to be between the ages of 18-26 and apply between July and October. Late submissions are usually accepted as they have many corps member positions to fill.
See more about application information, start terms, and deadlines: here.
Disclaimer
It is important to know that every year, team, project, and individual experience will be different. Thus, my experience will not be the same as your own, but it will at least give you an idea of what may be possible and how things can go.
This was my second year in NCCC so I knew what to expect and understood what challenges might cross my path. My second year was a lot different than my first in terms of project types, service work, team dynamics, and overall challenges. (You can read about my first year, here.) Yet, once again, it was a year I would not soon forget or regret.
A Year in NCCC: The North Central Region
Arriving in Iowa
After celebrating the holidays at home I flew out to Iowa to begin the new year as a Team Leader with Americorps NCCC. Once at the Cedar Rapids airport, I was picked up and brought back to the main campus in Vinton, Iowa. The drive is about 40 minutes from the airport to the home base.
Vinton is a small farm town with a historic downtown area and miles and miles of corn fields. The town provides access to everything you would need including a pharmacy, grocery stores, restaurants, and more. You can also run around town and try and find all of the colorful corn statues. The closest large city is Cedar Rapids where you will find a lot more to do and see.
Campus & Housing
The North Central campus was once a school for the blind and is made up of several large historic buildings with lots of outdoor lawn space to utilize. The buildings are connected by underground tunnels so there is no need to be outside in the winter to get from one location to another. The buildings not only hold meeting rooms, kitchens, bathrooms, and bedrooms for corps members, but provides multiple amenties that the surrounding community has access to, such as; a swimming pool, basketball court/gymnasium, workout room, auditorium, and more.
Corps member rooms are set up 'college dorm style' but the room layout varies by building. All rooms have beds (some are bunk beds), dressers, and windows. Some buildings/floors have separate communal bathrooms and others have bathrooms connected to their rooms. Each room consists of 2 team leaders, or 2-4 corps members. One or two rooms on campus can accomodate 6 corps members at a time.
Team Leader Training (TLT)
For the first several weeks in January, all of us team leaders went through team leader training. This consisted of understanding the ins and out of the program, safety, and the best practices for leading a team. We also received our necessary equipment: a TL cell phone, handbook, safety equipment, uniform (complete with the green TL shirt) a red bag (which we used to bring our personal belongings from one project to another) and any other gear we needed.
Corps Training Institute (CTI)
After TLT, around mid-February, it was time for the corps members to arrive. Over the course of one day they flew into Iowa from multiple locations around the USA. From there the team leaders and unit leaders coordinated their pick up, brought them to campus, and got them checked in. The following day was the start of corps training institute.
CTI is a full month where members are trained on various aspects of the program and prepare for their upcoming service year. Most of the training is classroom lecture style and can feel pretty slow. There is a lot to it, but not a lot you will need to know for the purpose of this post.
Some of the most important things we were trained on....
Independent Service Projects (ISPs): While in NCCC, corps members are required to complete 80 additional service hours that must be done with organizations other than their main sponsoring organization. This means 80 hours of service work that needs to be completed during your free time.
Food & Shopping: Each team is given a food budget that the TL is in charge of. You go shopping as a team and cook as a team. The way it worked for my team(s) was to assign cooking/cleaning partners each night for dinner, and buy the group supplies to make our own breakfasts and lunches.
Transportation: Each team is assigned a team van that the team uses to get around. Aside from the TL, two or three corps members per team are trained to be drivers.
Physical Training (PT): While in the program members must complete physical training as a team 3 times a week for 45mins per session. PT can range from going on a run, completing circuits, yoga, zumba, hiking, ect... It is not a intense as most people think.
Team Assignments
Toward the end of TLT each TL was assigned to a unit (cedar, oak, or maple) and given our team names. I was officially the TL of Cedar 5. Each unit had about 7 teams and was lead by a unit leader (a permanent staff member of the North Central Region who is basically the TL's boss).
We were given the names of our team members but told not to let anyone know who was on which team until team reveal. A week or so into CTI we were able to create a fun team reveal for the corps. After reveal we continued through training with our teams. This team would be our team for the first half of the program (the first two rounds). At the half way point we would switch teams for the remainder of the year.
Project Assignments
Note: Each campus assigns projects differently, and the way they do it can vary from year to year.
Service projects were given to the unit leaders, who then decided which of their team leaders should be sent on what project. Beforehand, as a team leader, I had the opportunity to meet with my unit leader and discuss what types of projects/service sectors I really wanted to serve in, as well as provide a list of my top service sectors.
About half way though CIT we were given our first round assignments to reveal to our teams. After round one, all project assignments are given to the TLs toward the end of the project they are currently on. This means the work you will do and locations you will be assigned are not told to you at the start of the program.
ROUND 1- A Split Round
For our first round my team was assigned a "split round". This means we would be completing more than one project during a round. We would travel to our first location and serve in that community for several weeks before relocating to another community for the remainder of the round.
Project Assignment 1: Living Lands and Waters
Our first assignment was with Living Lands and Waters in East Moline, Illinois. For 3-4 weeks, our team was to assist with the organization's million trees project. Every morning we would meet at the organization's headquarters and load up a trailer with supplies. Then we drove to either a local elementary or high school to set up tree wrapping stations. The stations (wrapping, watering, bagging, and tying) were lead by one of our members who would teach the students how to properly complete their job and send the sapling to the next station. Once complete, the saplings would then be donated to people who had the resources to plant them around their community.
Housing: Our housing was an Airbnb that Living Lands and Waters provided for us. It was a three story house with a back porch that overlooked the Mississippi river. We had a large kitchen, living room, two bathrooms, and four bedrooms that members shared. In the front yard, right behind a small driveway with a basketball hoop, were train tracks that a working train used to pass by several times throughout the day. The housing was very modern and overall amazing.
ISPs: As our team was only here for a few weeks, we only participated in one ISP, which was weed pulling and trail clearing with a local non-profit.
PT: Our team utilized the basketball hoop in our front yard and had at least one basketball game per week. We also took advantage of the spacious housing to complete circuits and took a few hikes on the trails around the area.
Free Time: With Chicago being less than 3 hours away, our team rented cars (on our own time and dime) and spent a weekend exploring the bustling city. We also spent our downtime exploring East Moline and enjoying the fire pit we had access to in our backyard, right along the river.
Challenges: The biggest challenge for us was that our housing ended up flooding. Due to the rising water levels of the Mississippi that year, a lot of homes along the river ended up flooding. We had to evacuate during the last couple of days and stayed in a hotel room provided by our sponsoring organization.
Project Assignment 2: Valley Forge
For the last 4-5 weeks of our round, we left Illinois and drove to King of Prussia, Pennsylvania to work with Valley Forge National Historical Park. Our main focus was invasive species removal of invasive crayfish. While almost every team gets to deal with invasive species removal at some point, you usually deal with removing types of plants, not something that could fight you back. Thus, this was a rare project and very cool.
Our team would suit up in waiters and walk through the rivers, using our nets to collect the invasive crayfish who were killing the native species that supported the ecosystem. Then we would take the invasive ones back to be ethically euthanized by putting them in a freezer to fall into a permanent sleep. We also completed other projects including; tree planting, seed spreading, deer population counting, spotted lantern fly removal, mustard seed removal, walkway resteration, and more.
Housing: Our team lived on Valley Forge property in the Maurice Stephen's House, an old farm house from 1816. The building was filled with hidden compartments and oldtimey secrets. It was two stories with a large kitchen, living room, sun room, basement, and multiple bedrooms. It was lightly furnished with couches, tables, and chairs they brought in for us to use. Our team packed cots and sleeping bags from campus to use for our bedrooms.
PT: Our house was surrounded with open green space, and we had the entire park to utilize for exploration and active team games or circuit. There was also a gym close by that belonged to the police force who allowed us to use their workout equipment.
Free Time: A lot of free time was used to explore Valley Forge. We also took a day trip to the King of Prussia Mall, the third largest mall in the USA in terms of total square footage. Since the city of Philadelphia was less than an hour away, we were able to get permission to drive the team van into the city to explore.
Challenges: Most of our challenges in this round came from the group navigating how to work as a team, as our last project we did most of our work separately.
First Transition
When our first round had come to an end we packed up the team van and drove back to Iowa for our first transition. Transition is when all the teams return to base to debrief their last project and prepare for their next one. It takes place between every round. It did take more than one day for us to get back to campus, so we stayed in hotels along the way that I, as the TL, booked on the team budget.
ROUND 2
Project Assignment: Standing Rock
For our second round our team was off to Fort Yates, North Dakota to serve on the Standing Rock Reservation with the Sioux County Extension Office. Our main project was to report to various locations around the community and set up hoop houses to be used for growing fruits and veggies. Each hoop house took 1-2 days to construct, but eventually our team got into a great rhythm and had the process down to one work day.
Once our team completed constructing all of the hoop houses, we assisted in the community garden by planting and weeding. During our last week we painted the inside of one of the schools while the children were on vacation.
Housing: For this round our team lived in a high school on the reservation. We were given two classrooms to use for our bedrooms, one for the men and one for the women. We used mats and sleeping bags for our beds that were provided by NCCC. The teacher's lounge was our kitchen, dining room, and meeting space, and the locker rooms were our bathrooms and shower space. We were also able to use the gymnasium for PT, and one of the teachers set up Netflix in her classroom for us to use during our down time.
ISPs: We were fortunate enough to be at the reservation during the Standing Rock Powwow. For multiple weekends we worked with the Tribal Community to set up for the powwow, pick up trash during the event, and put everything away at the end. We also spent a few weekends volunteering at the Bismark Zoo, raking leaves and cleaning old enclosures.
PT: Having the school gymnasium to utilise was great. We played team basketball games, completed circuits, had races, and more. It was the perfect PT space.
Free Time: There was not a lot to do on the reservation, so we spent a lot of time driving into Bismark, the closest city (also the only place we could buy groceries). We hung out in coffee shops, tried different restaurants, and explored the city. During a long weekend, the majority of our team rented a car and drove out to visit the Badlands and Mount Rushmore.
Challenges: The biggest challenge for our team was keeping occupied. There was not a lot to do around us and it was not safe to walk around, so we spent a lot of time watching Netflix in our housing. Without alot to occupy our time, tensions between some members escalated (as they do on every team). We also completed our work so fast that there was a lot of extra time trying to find what other type of work we could get done/assist with.
Second Transition, Summer Break, & Team Swap
After our second round it was time to swap teams. We said goodbye to our current teams, then there was a new team reveal and some time to get to know each other. Not everyone switched teams, I personally had two members remain on my team. Members who switch teams stay with their units. Meaning if you were on a cedar team you stay in the cedar unit, you cannot swap to a team in the maple unit. All teams are created by unit leaders.
Before we headed to round three, everyone went on summer break. This meant that we had a couple weeks off (a bit less for team leaders) to enjoy as we pleased. Many members went home to see family, some went on vacation with their friends, and a few chose to remain on campus. After vacation, the corps returned to campus and got ready for their next round.
ROUND 3 - Split Round
For round three our team was sent to to multiple locations in Wisconsin to work with three different organizations.
Project Assignment 1: Camp To Belong
For the first half of our round we were sent to work with Camp To Belong -Wisconsin. Camp To Belong is an organization that runs a summer camp program "at which children placed in out-of-home care can be with their biological siblings to build shared memories and connections." Our team got to be summer camp counselors and help create memories and run activities for the children to partake in.
Since camp and training only took about 2 weeks, our team also assisted the Fond du Lac County United Way with several projects during the weeks leading up to camp. We assisted in packing lunches for their food assistance program and completed trail maintenance around the community.
When it was time for camp, our members were split up into cabin groups with other staff members/counselors. As the counselors of these groups, we safety saw our campers to and from different activities, meals, and scheduled programing. We also got to partipate in activities with the campers, singing along to campfire songs, showing them how to cast a line at the fishing dock, volunteering for the dunk tank during the carnival, and more.
Housing: For the first week before camp started, our team lived in a Salvation Army, utilizing their gymnasium as our bedrooms by setting up dividers and cots. We had access to bathrooms, showers, a kitchen, and dining area. During camp our team lived in the cabins with our cabin groups. Each cabin had bunk beds, electricity, and a bathhouse nearby. Food was provided for all staff and campers.
PT: While staying at the salvation army, there was a gym across the street that we were able to get free passes to and workout there. While at camp our team had to take a pause on PT because we were looking after campers 24/7 and could not break away for the regular NCCC scheduled programming.
Challenges: This project hit home for the majority of our team and members were stretched emotionally as we learned about the foster care system and listened to the stories of the people around us. It was an experience not one of my members will soon forget.
Project Assignment 2: Waukesha County Land Conservancy
For the second half of our round, we served with the Waukesha County Land Conservancy in Waukesha, Wisconsin. Here, our work consisted of clearing invasive species from the base of oak trees, collecting and planting native seeds, and identifying dragonfly and bee species in the area. To identify the dragonflies we ran around catching them with large nets. Once caught, we held their wings a specifc way as to not hurt them, but be able to identify them for a proper species count. For bee identification, we walked around feilds full of flowers, taking photos of the bees then matching the picture with our charts. We even found an endangered bee species that could be used to support the preservation of a specific area in the community.
Housing: Our team lived in a house that was once used as the conservancy's old offices. It was far off in the woods, so we had plenty of places to roam. The house was two stories with a furnished basement that the women used as their bedroom, a bedroom upstairs for the boys to share, two bathrooms, a kitchen, and small living space.
PT: With us being a mile down the road from the main street, we used the road to our house to go on team jogs/walks and even had a team race once or twice. Our project sponsor had access to canoes and kayaks so we were able to get out onto the river to paddle. Some days we would go on a team hike and others we would complete circuits or workout challenges.
Free Time: We spent a lot of free time relaxing in the woods around our house or going down to the pond to swim or canoe. We explored downtown Waukesha and took a day trip to Milwaukee as a team.
Challenges: The hardest part about the second half of this round was transitioning from an emotionally heavy project to a physical one. It was hard for some members to change their mindset so quickly. The days we spent clearing out weeds and shrubs in the heat was exhausting, but dealing with the large amount of gnats that consistantly swarmed us when doing so was even more frustrating.
Third Transition
Our very last transition was no different then the others. We debreifed our last project by giving a presentation in front of our unit leaders regarding the outcome of the completed project. Then we made a "project portfolio" that detailed helpful information for the next team who might take on that project. After, we prepared for our next project by doing research, meeting as a team to work out logistics and overall expectations, and then meeting with our unit leaders to review and get any other questions answered. Some other things you can expect from transition weeks are; a bit of downtime, training or seminars, catching up with friends, completing ISP hours, PT with the corps or with other teams, completing paperwork, and team meetings.
ROUND 4
Project Assignment: Habitat for Humanity
For round four we were sent to Marquette, Michigan to serve with Marquette County Habitat for Humanity. While you usually build houses when working with Habitat, our team had another mission. We were to build a small storage warehouse behind the Habitat office where they could safely store supplies for their housing projects. Over the course of 8 weeks we completed this building from start to finish. When we arrived there was only a slab of concrete and when we left there was a fully finished warehouse. We built and put up walls, flew tresses, worked on roofing, installed doors, installed insulation, built shelves, and more.
Housing: In Marquette, our team had access to two apartments across the street from each other, one for the women and one for the men. Each apartment was two stories with three bedrooms, two bathrooms, a kitchen, living room, dining room, and basement. We had access to a large yard in the back of one of the apartments that we shared with neighbors.
ISPs: During the last round we accumulated our remaining ISP hours by volunteering at the local farmers market and at the local soup kitchen.
PT: Most of our PT was done by utilizing the open space in the backyard and in the basement. We did team challenges, circuits, soccer games, and yoga.
Free Time: Our free time was spent exploring Marquette, checking out the many hiking trails, sitting in coffee shops downtown, and engaging in many community activities such as music nights and the farmers market. We also took a day trip to Prisque Isle Park.
Challenges: Since we were at the end of the year a lot of members were exhausted emotionally and physically. For some it was a big push to get to the end of the program.
Graduation
Once the final round came to an end we loaded up the van and headed back to meet the other teams at campus. We completed our final debrief and began packing to go home as we planned for graduation.
In the North Central region, each team gets the chance to create a mural that they paint on the walls of one of the buildings on campus. You also put together a team trifold presentation of your last two rounds to be put on display during graduation. During graduation, corps members wear their white polo shirts and team leaders wear their green polo shirts with matching black pants (also known as the americorps tuxedo). You sit with your team and cross the stage to get your diploma and medal of community service.
After graduation it is time to get in the van one last time to make the final drive to the airport and head off to your next adventure.
Conclusion
Well there you have it! A year in NCCC. If you read my post about a year in the Pacific Region, you can tell a lot is the same with some minor differences. Again, your year will look different than mine, but hopefully I gave you some ideas of the type of projects you may be working, housing you could be living in, and the program itself.
Good luck with your service year and I hope it is unforgettable.
Commentaires