National Civilian Community Corps
Encyclopedia
AmeriCorps
AmeriCorps is a U.S. federal government program that was created under President Bill Clinton by the National and Community Service Trust Act of 1993 and later expanded by 50 percent under President George W. Bush...
program that engages 18– to 24-year-olds in team-based national and community service in the United States. National Civilian Community Corps teams complete about four different six- to eight-week-long projects during their 10-month term of service. Each team is made up of eight to twelve Corps Members and one Team Leader. Corps Members and Team Leaders are representative of all colors, creeds, states, and economic status. Approximately 1,200 Corps Member and Team Leaders are chosen annually to serve at one of five regional campuses, located in Sacramento, California
Sacramento, California
Sacramento is the capital city of the U.S. state of California and the county seat of Sacramento County. It is located at the confluence of the Sacramento River and the American River in the northern portion of California's expansive Central Valley. With a population of 466,488 at the 2010 census,...
; Denver, Colorado
Denver, Colorado
The City and County of Denver is the capital and the most populous city of the U.S. state of Colorado. Denver is a consolidated city-county, located in the South Platte River Valley on the western edge of the High Plains just east of the Front Range of the Rocky Mountains...
; Vinton, Iowa
Vinton, Iowa
-2010 census:The 2010 census recorded a population of 5,257 in the city, with a population density of . There were 2,299 housing units, of which 2,187 were occupied....
; Vicksburg, Mississippi
Vicksburg, Mississippi
Vicksburg is a city in Warren County, Mississippi, United States. It is the only city in Warren County. It is located northwest of New Orleans on the Mississippi and Yazoo rivers, and due west of Jackson, the state capital. In 1900, 14,834 people lived in Vicksburg; in 1910, 20,814; in 1920,...
; and Perry Point, Maryland
Perry Point, Maryland
Perry Point is an unincorporated community in Cecil County, Maryland, United States....
. Each campus serves as a training center and hub for a multi-state region. Members are required to complete a minimum of 1,700 hours of service, including 80 independent service hours, though members complete an average of 1,850 service hours per term.
The mission of the NCCC program is “To strengthen communities and develop leaders through team-based national and community service.”
Benefits
While serving in AmeriCorps NCCC, Corps Members receive:- Room and board
- Modest living stipend
- $5,550 Education award
- Limited healthcare coverage
- Uniforms
- Training
- Travel
After successfully completing a term of service, all AmeriCorps NCCC members are enrolled in the National Service Trust and are eligible to receive a Segal AmeriCorps Education Award. A Segal AmeriCorps Education Award can be used to pay education costs at qualified institutions of higher education, for educational training, or to repay qualified student loans. The award for full-time AmeriCorps programs, including NCCC, is currently $5,550, based on the maximum value of the Pell Grant. The award can be accessed in full or in part, and those qualified have seven years after their term of service has ended to claim the award. Individuals can only receive Education Awards for two terms of AmeriCorps service: Full-time, half-time, reduced half-time, quarter time, and minimum time terms of service each count as one term of service.
Inception (1992)
The NCCC program was loosely based on the depression era Civilian Conservation CorpsCivilian Conservation Corps
The Civilian Conservation Corps was a public work relief program that operated from 1933 to 1942 in the United States for unemployed, unmarried men from relief families, ages 18–25. A part of the New Deal of President Franklin D...
(CCC), although in practice, the differences between NCCC and CCC projects can be quite marked in both practical intent and outcome. In some respects, NCCC teams resemble their CCC predecessors, who were also required to function under rugged conditions for prolonged periods and engage in strenuous conservation and wildfire-fighting projects, flood control, and disaster relief.. Unlike the original CCC, the NCCC was not created to be a public work relief program, but rather was designed to help communities meet self-identified needs through service projects and develop leadership skills in its participants.
In 1992, "a bipartisan group of Senators worked hand-in-hand with the first Bush Administration to resurrect the CCC in a new form for a new era, creating what is now as AmeriCorps NCCC...."
Official founding (1993-2005)
With bipartisan sponsorship, the program was enacted into law in 1993 (referred to as the "Civilian Community Corps") and signed by President Bill ClintonBill Clinton
William Jefferson "Bill" Clinton is an American politician who served as the 42nd President of the United States from 1993 to 2001. Inaugurated at age 46, he was the third-youngest president. He took office at the end of the Cold War, and was the first president of the baby boomer generation...
as a demonstration program charged with determining:
- Whether federally funded residential service programs can significantly increase the support for national and community service
- Whether such programs can expand the opportunities for young men and women to perform meaningful, direct, and consequential acts of community service in a manner that will enhance their own skills while contributing to their understanding of civic responsibility in the United States
- Whether retired members of the armed forces can provide guidance and training under such programs that contribute meaningfully to the encouragement of national service
- Whether domestic national service programs can serve as a substitute for the traditional option of military service.
While some of the primary motivations cited in the 1993 inception of AmeriCorps NCCC changed and evolved over time, the basic focus of the program has remained the same: environment, education, public safety, and other unmet needs, disaster relief, and the addition of a "disaster services (preparedness and response)" heading in 2006/7.
2005 - Present
Much of the Fiscal Year 2006 and 2007 funding issued to NCCC was directly specified as being intended for hurricane relief in the Katrina impacted upper-gulf region. In 2007, in response to budget pressures, the Corporation for National and Community ServiceCorporation For National and Community Service
The Corporation for National and Community Service is a federal agency that engages more than five million Americans in service through Senior Corps, AmeriCorps, and Learn and Serve America, and other national service initiatives...
announced the closure of the Charleston, SC and Washington, DC campuses. Sixty percent of the remaining NCCC will be deployed to the Gulf Coast to aid with Hurricane Katrina relief until at least 2010.
In 2008 the NCCC opened a new campus in Vinton, IA. Also, along with Iowa, in July 2009 the National Civilian Community Corps opened a new Campus in Vicksburg, Mississippi.
Overview
Before starting project work, members go through team building exercises, physical training and special training for the individual jobs they will hold on the team. During this time, members also receive extensive training in first aid/CPR and disaster relief through the Red Cross. They are also trained on how to use different tools and other equipment they might need throughout their projects.Projects fall into one or more of five areas: disaster response, infrastructure improvement
Infrastructure
Infrastructure is basic physical and organizational structures needed for the operation of a society or enterprise, or the services and facilities necessary for an economy to function...
, environmental stewardship and conservation
Environment (biophysical)
The biophysical environment is the combined modeling of the physical environment and the biological life forms within the environment, and includes all variables, parameters as well as conditions and modes inside the Earth's biosphere. The biophysical environment can be divided into two categories:...
, energy conservation
Energy conservation
Energy conservation refers to efforts made to reduce energy consumption. Energy conservation can be achieved through increased efficient energy use, in conjunction with decreased energy consumption and/or reduced consumption from conventional energy sources...
, and urban and rural development
Rural development
Rural development in general denotes economic development and community development actions and initiatives taken to improve the standard of living in non-urban neighbourhoods, remote villages and the countryside...
. Teams frequently work with non-profit organizations such as Habitat For Humanity and the American Red Cross
American Red Cross
The American Red Cross , also known as the American National Red Cross, is a volunteer-led, humanitarian organization that provides emergency assistance, disaster relief and education inside the United States. It is the designated U.S...
, tutor students in public schools, and build trails for various national and state parks.
Disaster Relief
The National Civilian Community Corps may be called on to respond to any Federal or State disaster including fires, floods, earthquakes, oil spills, mudslides, hurricanes, tornadoes, or terrorist attacks.Environment
NCCC performs environmental work in a number of areas, usually in collaboration with state and national parks.Education
NCCC teams have worked in partnership with school systems across the country. A summary of national service work by AmeriCorps NCCC, released in early 2006, states that NCCC had by then tutored 319,000 students.In conjunction with the American Council on Education (ACE), NCCC Corps Members who complete course requirements during their year of service can earn undergraduate credits hours for "Introduction to Service Learning" and "Core Supervisory Skills." (See ACE's "National Guide Online")
Upon successful completion of service, NCCC Corps Members earn a (taxable) education award of $5,350 for college tuition -- awards that are matched by many colleges and universities.
Fire fighting
All National Civilian Community Corps members are trained in CPR, first aid, and disaster services, and about 15 percent become red-card certified fire fighters.NCCC teams have successfully served in fighting major wildland fires and in completing fire mitigation work, according to National Park Service and U.S. Forest Service officials.
Summer of Service
The NCCC Summer of Service is an intensive summer program designed to introduce youth ages 14 to 17 to national service and to foster such values as teamwork, responsibility, and the ethic of serving your community. Like the year-round AmeriCorps NCCC experience, NCCC Summer of Service combines the best practices of structured team-based activities with service-learning programming. In 2008, Summer of Service participants engaged in service projects in Los Angeles; Memphis; New Orleans; Sacramento, Denver; Camden, N.J.; Baltimore; Washington, D.C.; and HoustonImpact and reactions
"Since 1994, more than 12,000 members have invested more than 20 million service hours on 6,500 service projects with thousands of nonprofit organizations and other public agencies to provide disaster services, tutor children, preserve the environment, build homes for low-income families and meet other challenges.In FY 2008, 60 percent of members served in the Gulf Coast Region on multiple team deployments assisting local communities to recover from the effects of Hurricanes Katrina
Hurricane Katrina
Hurricane Katrina of the 2005 Atlantic hurricane season was a powerful Atlantic hurricane. It is the costliest natural disaster, as well as one of the five deadliest hurricanes, in the history of the United States. Among recorded Atlantic hurricanes, it was the sixth strongest overall...
, Rita
Hurricane Rita
Hurricane Rita was the fourth-most intense Atlantic hurricane ever recorded and the most intense tropical cyclone ever observed in the Gulf of Mexico. Rita caused $11.3 billion in damage on the U.S. Gulf Coast in September 2005...
, Gustav
Hurricane Gustav
The name Gustav has been used for five tropical cyclones in the Atlantic Ocean:* 1984's Tropical Storm Gustav - Spent most of its existence as a tropical depression hovering over Bermuda, no major damage was reported....
, Ike
Hurricane Ike
Hurricane Ike was the second-costliest hurricane ever to make landfall in the United States, the costliest hurricane ever to impact Cuba and the second most active hurricane to reach the Canadian mainland in the Great Lakes Region after Hurricane Hazel in 1954...
, Dolly
Hurricane Dolly (2008)
Hurricane Dolly was a tropical cyclone that made landfall in extreme southern Texas in July 2008. Dolly was the fourth tropical cyclone and second hurricane to form during the 2008 Atlantic hurricane season. It was the first U.S. landfalling hurricane of the 2008 season. Dolly developed on July 20...
, and Wilma
Hurricane Wilma
Hurricane Wilma was the most intense tropical cyclone ever recorded in the Atlantic basin. Wilma was the twenty-second storm , thirteenth hurricane, sixth major hurricane, and fourth Category 5 hurricane of the record-breaking 2005 season...
.
Hurricane Katrina Response
AmeriCorps NCCC, a team-based residential program for 18-24 year-olds, has made Hurricane KatrinaHurricane Katrina
Hurricane Katrina of the 2005 Atlantic hurricane season was a powerful Atlantic hurricane. It is the costliest natural disaster, as well as one of the five deadliest hurricanes, in the history of the United States. Among recorded Atlantic hurricanes, it was the sixth strongest overall...
response its primary focus these past three years, deploying more than 4,000 members to intensive assignments in the Gulf. National Civilian Community Corps members have refurbished 9,500 homes, built 1,450 new homes, completed 52,000 damage assessments, and trained and supervised more than 227,000 volunteers. ".
Criticisms
AmeriCorps (which includes the NCCC program) is a USA federally funded "network of more than 3,000 non-profit organizations, public agencies, and faith-based organizations." AmeriCorps has met with sharp criticisms from fiscal conservatives who accused it of being a "boondoggle", most notably by libertarian James BovardJames Bovard
James Bovard is a libertarian author and lecturer whose political commentary targets examples of waste, failures, corruption, cronyism and abuses of power in government. He is the author of Attention Deficit Democracy, and eight other books...
in a Fox News
Fox News Channel
Fox News Channel , often called Fox News, is a cable and satellite television news channel owned by the Fox Entertainment Group, a subsidiary of News Corporation...
article that covered proposals to cut funding for the program.
Funding
As a part of AmeriCorpsAmeriCorps
AmeriCorps is a U.S. federal government program that was created under President Bill Clinton by the National and Community Service Trust Act of 1993 and later expanded by 50 percent under President George W. Bush...
, within the Corporation for National and Community Service
Corporation For National and Community Service
The Corporation for National and Community Service is a federal agency that engages more than five million Americans in service through Senior Corps, AmeriCorps, and Learn and Serve America, and other national service initiatives...
, the National Civilian Community Corps is Congressionally funded. Appropriations are proposed by the Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies subcommittees in the House of Representative and in the Senate.
Other than a one-time supplemental appropriation for Gulf-Coast hurricane relief, NCCC funding has remained at approximately $25 – $26 million since 2002.
As of early October 2007, the Senate and House had yet to meet in conference to arrive at consensus legislation.
See also
- Youth serviceYouth serviceYouth service refers to non-military, intensive engagement of young people in organized activity that contributes to the local, national, or world community. Youth service is widely recognized and valued by society, with minimal or no compensation to the server. Youth service also provides...
- National serviceNational serviceNational service is a common name for mandatory government service programmes . The term became common British usage during and for some years following the Second World War. Many young people spent one or more years in such programmes...
- Service learning
- Community serviceCommunity serviceCommunity service is donated service or activity that is performed by someone or a group of people for the benefit of the public or its institutions....
- Volunteerism
- Camp HopeCamp HopeCamp Hope , is a volunteer base camp located in a former school in St. Bernard Parish, Louisiana. Camp Hope has welcomed people from all over the United States and all over the world who have come to participate in the massive recovery efforts of St...
- AmericorpsAmeriCorpsAmeriCorps is a U.S. federal government program that was created under President Bill Clinton by the National and Community Service Trust Act of 1993 and later expanded by 50 percent under President George W. Bush...