Sunday, July 26, 2009

The Real TRUTH About AmeriCorps (and yes, AmeriCorps does Suck for many unlucky people)

Heather over at http://amerimama.blogspot.com/2007/05/americorps-sucks-i-hate-americorps.html is a stupid, uneducated, hot tempered loser bitch that is full of herself, hypocitical, and doesn't know the real truth.


You CAN quit/totally abandon AmeriCorps and get a federal, government, or state job. These myths need to be dispelled for former AmeriCorps volunteers not being about to get government jobs if they just pick up and leave AmeriCorps without any formal notice. AmeriCorps is VOLUNTEERING and NOT a JOB. If you find another job, just quit. If you fill out the paper work, then fine. If not, it DOESN'T MATTER because AmeriCorps is VOLUNTEERING and not a JOB. As long as you didn't commit a felony, have decent credit, and pay your taxes, anyone can get a federal job.

AmeriCorps does suck and it is just craptacular; just a waste of tax payers money. If you were able to get into an awesome site with a supervisor that gives a care about the agency and what you have to say, kudos to you. If you were like the rest of us that got screwed over with just absolutely retarded, uneducated, and uncaring supervisors and staff, I feel your pain.

13 comments:

  1. I'm about ready to quit my program myself, are you 100% positive about it not having an effect on Federal hiring? I'm worried because we had to take an oath and sign a form at PSO... I didn't see any posts by a heather on your link btw, what did she say about it!?

    ReplyDelete
  2. Could you write more about your experience? This is basically what I wrote for my exit survey and it's the gist of my experience:

    I rate my AmeriCorps experience as “fair” because while I was beyond pleased by the work I did at my site (Seattle Community Court) and the mentorship/supervision I received there, I was incredibly disappointed by the Solid Ground JustServe program. I entered the Solid Ground JustServe program because of their mission to work for “a just and safe community”. I did not realize that that mission did not pertain to the JustServe members themselves. If members did not agree with what Solid Ground was teaching or had a different analysis of what they were teaching, they were told they were wrong and going against anti-racism/anti-oppression work. Members were often misled about timing of meetings and what we would be learning. Often times, I got the feeling that the JustServe supervisor and/or the team leader(s) were unprepared to teach the members anything of importance or value. At one point during the year, a trainer, an employee of Solid Ground, berated me in front of my peers during a one-day class. Solid Ground responded to my request to meet with them, but I felt the meeting was just to placate me rather than do anything to ensure that that kind of behavior would be prohibited in the future. As for the AmeriCorps program itself: I am still not sure what kind of oversight there is for non-profits who receive AmeriCorps funding. It seems that the AmeriCorps program takes advantage of the idealism and eagerness of the youth wanting to serve their country: nowhere is it clearly stated that the education award would be taxed at 18%; there is no clear way of lodging a complaint online; prospective members are misled to think that AmeriCorps is a central organization and they will actually be working for AmeriCorps, when that is not the case at all. I would like to reiterate that my site, Seattle Community Court, and my supervisor there were wonderful and I fully appreciated the many learning opportunities they provided. My criticisms are against the JustServe program of Solid Ground.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Same here. I could be more productive playing world of Warcraft while drinking mountain dew while probably making more money.

    ReplyDelete
  4. I have had pretty much the same experience! Funny how i couldn't find a single bad post about Americorps before I joined lol. Anyway, I'm handing in my notice this week, can't take another 7 months of colossal time wasting. Does anyone know if there are special requirements to quit? I was just going to do the cliche 2 weeks thing...

    ReplyDelete
  5. Same experience, Underage drinking + sex in my dorm at 3:23 in the morning when I have pt at 5:30 + incompetent staff = waste of American tax dollars. That’s not all though. CTI is probably the most horribly organized and thoughtless part of the entire program. Some of what they teach is important stuff. The way they do it though is through 12 hour days of lecture. Ever heard of telling isn’t training? AmeriCorps hasn’t. By the end of the day your brain is so full of stuff it’s about to overheat and erupt into a hellhole of standards and practices! CTI is also full of time wasters like worthless power points, and incomprehensibly long lectures. One of which was all about teaching us how to wield that tricky beast they call “the hammer.” They also taught me CPR in the time it takes to play how to save a life! Obviously that’s a joke, but I was certified in less than 3 hours with 2 hours remaining of that class. My unit leader was intentionally abrasive to promote internal conflict on my team (which worked, because most of us hated each.) So CONCLUSION AmeriCorps sucks, and if you can embrace that suck and survive your term. Years of therapy will most certainly await you so you can overcome that severe case of PTSD you got from your service in AmeriCorps.

    ReplyDelete
  6. If federal work is anything like what I'm doing now, I'd rather stick an ice pick in my eye. I hate my service site like a pure magnesium hates water. I'm trapped far from home and loved ones, broke, and unable to get home. This was supposed to help me get my life in order, but it's just made things even worse. I can't begin to articulate the depth my my anger and sorrow in this situation. I have made it my mission to tell everyone remotely receptive to my message not to join this awful organization.

    ReplyDelete
  7. If federal work is anything like what I'm doing now, I'd rather stick an ice pick in my eye. I hate my service site like a pure magnesium hates water. I'm trapped far from home and loved ones, broke, and unable to get home. This was supposed to help me get my life in order, but it's just made things even worse. I can't begin to articulate the depth my my anger and sorrow in this situation. I have made it my mission to tell everyone remotely receptive to my message not to join this awful organization.

    ReplyDelete
  8. My supervisor is unresponsive and condescending. As a recent college graduate I joined to gain some new experience and to get some money to pay off my student loans. Now I'm realizing I should have just pursued traditional employment. What this feels like is an unsuccessful college internship.

    ReplyDelete
  9. So glad I found all you guys, I'm planning on leaving my Americorps job next week. I've been frustrated with this organization from the beginning, but I went with it because of the education reward. Turns out they lied to me, they told me the reward would be a lot more than it actually is. I only became more frustrated, but stayed because I didn't have any other job prospects at the time and didn't want to abandon my site. I'm in the Read-Graduate-Succeed program, so I'm at a Jr. High and I run a tutoring program for the at-risk kids. Me and one other person at my site built up this program from the ground, and I've gotten to know the kids, and I've seen real progress. But none of this has come about because of Americorps, they ask me to run this program but they don't know or care about the work I put into it every day. I'm full time, and they're asking for 50 hour work weeks with 40 hour volunteer weeks, which is a total of 90 hour weeks, which is insane. They care more about their weird, useless rules and regulations than about their reps and the impact those reps are making. I also answer to my site as a full time job on it's own, so I'm essentially doing two full time jobs for $9 an hour. On top of this I have a severe panic disorder, and Americorps has sent me into downward spiraling months of panic attacks and depression. And for what? $9 an hour? An education reward that won't even make a dent in my student loans? No. I'm done. Hopefully my site can hire me on, and I can continue working with the kids and making more money without Americorps breathing down my neck and holding me back from really helping. If my site can't hire me on, it's not worth staying. I'll be sad to leave my tutoring and my kids, but my life is a mess because of this job and something has to change.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Omg I love everything you said. I have been panicking so bad and I want to quit but I have no idea how to even approach the subject. I asked for one day of teleservice a week and wasn't even allowed to submit the request to CNCS. How are you going to go about quitting?

      Delete
    2. Just realized this was last year, did you quit?? How'd it go?? Are you amazingly happy?

      Delete