AmeriCorps Connections

Tisha Vonique: The Third Pillar | AmeriCorps Connections

What happens when your AmeriCorps service doesn't just change your career — it unlocks the final piece of who you are? For Tisha Vonique, two terms of national service revealed the third pillar of her identity: health equity. And she hasn't stopped building since.   About This Episode Tisha Vonique describes herself as a "catalyzer of curiosity" — and that phrase alone tells you everything you need to know about how she moves through the world. A strategist, coach, and community organizer based in Central Texas, Tisha has built a life around three interlocking pillars: education, community, and health equity. And she'll tell you directly: AmeriCorps gave her the third one.   "When you made a conscious choice to do AmeriCorps, you made a conscious choice to say and to feel that things can be better. Your experience as an AmeriCorps member was, and is, an expression of resistance." — Tisha Vonique   #StillGettingThingsDone   Ready to Turn Intention Into Action? If this conversation activated something in you — don't just let that feeling sit there. Find social-impact jobs, volunteer opportunities, and community initiatives at Idealist — connecting 40 million+ people across 180 countries with opportunities to do good.   Find your next opportunity here: 👉 IDEALIST  [https://www.idealist.org/en?utm_source=podcast&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=americorpsconnections]  And check out Idealist Days — monthly dates of local, positive action!   Connect With Tisha Vonique Austin AmeriCorps Alumni Chapter: @AustinAmeriCorpsAlums | @ATXAmeriCorpsAlums on LinkedIn   Interested in joining the chapter leadership or showing up to events? Find them on Instagram, LinkedIn, and Linktree. Whether you served in Austin or just call it home now — you belong here.   About AmeriCorps Connections AmeriCorps Connections lifts up real stories of AmeriCorps alumni — 100+ featured! Honest, unfiltered truth about national service. These alums aren't just reflecting — they're still getting things done! We believe these voices deserve to be heard, and we're just getting started! ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★ [https://patreon.com/AmeriCorpsConnectionsPodcast?utm_medium=unknown&utm_source=join_link&utm_campaign=creatorshare_creator&utm_content=copyLink]

20 Years Later, His Mural Was Still on the Wall — Rok Locksley's Life in Service

What happens when an artist, a restless servant-leader, and a lifelong learner become the same person? You get Rok Locksley — AmeriCorps NCCC alum (2003), AmeriCorps State & National alum (2023), and two-time Peace Corps volunteer who spent decades painting murals in small-town Texas, building youth centers in Eastern Europe, gamifying parks in Illinois, and learning — over and over again — that the work is never really about you. In this episode, Rok takes us through a life shaped by national and international service: from rebuilding a flood-damaged park in Castroville, TX and painting the pool mural that's still standing 20 years later, to opening a youth center in the Moldovan village that literally translates to "Rok's Place." (Yes, really.) He even painted the resurrection scene on the ceiling of the local Orthodox church. Just another Tuesday in the Peace Corps. But the moment that stopped us both in our tracks? When his Moldovan counterpart Vadim looked at him after the newly-built, perfectly frumos youth center was already full of kids, computers already broken, and said quietly: "Rok. This youth center is not for you. It's for them." That's the line. That's the whole podcast. Rok is currently a Training Designer for the Peace Corps, where he brings his art, his gamification obsession, and his deep community development roots into designing learning experiences that actually stick. He's also living proof that serving once is just the beginning. 🎙️ These alums aren't just reflecting — they're #StillGettingThingsDone 🔗 Subscribe for new episodes every week featuring real, unfiltered stories from AmeriCorps alumni who are still getting things done. AmeriCorps Connections lifts up real stories of AmeriCorps alumni — 100+ featured! Honest, unfiltered truth about national service. These alums aren't just reflecting — they're still getting things done! We believe these voices deserve to be heard, and we're just getting started! ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★ [https://patreon.com/AmeriCorpsConnectionsPodcast?utm_medium=unknown&utm_source=join_link&utm_campaign=creatorshare_creator&utm_content=copyLink]

250 & Beyond | Breaking Stigma Is Hard. But It's Worth It | Catherine Hicks

Catherine Hicks came into her AmeriCorps year with 30 years of tech behind her, a master's in public health ahead of her, and a personal connection to the work that made everything matter more. A fresh alum at the time of recording, Catherine served with the National Coalition Against Prescription Drug Abuse in the Bay Area — a harm reduction organization doing life-saving work distributing Naloxone and fentanyl test strips to communities facing the overdose crisis. She brought her tech background to modernize the organization's website and expand its reach, translating it into multiple languages so more people could access resources. But the moment that defined her year? Hearing back that a friend used the Naloxone training she provided — and someone came home because of it. Catherine's story is about showing up even when you keep hearing "no." It's about finding out that your lived experience isn't a liability — it's your greatest asset. And it's about the quiet, radical act of seeing every person as human. "We need to find the humanity in all people — not just people like us." — Catherine Hicks #StillGettingThingsDone _______________________________________  🤝 This episode is part of a special series produced in partnership with 250&Beyond: Our American Story and our partners [https://www.nmcfs.org/250andbeyond]: The National Museum and Center for Service [https://www.nmcfs.org/] — A national organization developing a truly national museum and center dedicated to honoring and inspiring service in ALL its forms. Independent Sector [https://independentsector.org/] — The only national membership organization that brings together a diverse community of changemakers, nonprofits, foundations, and corporations working to strengthen civil society and ensure all people in the United States thrive. WETA [https://weta.org/]— Founded in 1961, WETA is the leading public broadcasting station in the nation's capital, serving their community with educational, cultural, news, and public affairs programs and services.  ________________________________________ AmeriCorps Connections lifts up real stories of AmeriCorps alumni — 100+ featured! Honest, unfiltered truth about national service. These alums aren't just reflecting — they're still getting things done! We believe these voices deserve to be heard, and we're just getting started! ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★ [https://patreon.com/AmeriCorpsConnectionsPodcast?utm_medium=unknown&utm_source=join_link&utm_campaign=creatorshare_creator&utm_content=copyLink]

250 & Beyond | The Best Way to See Your Community Is Through Someone Else's Eyes"

She survived a tropical storm, was at AmeriCorps headquarters on 9/11, and once made sure volunteers were fed during the anthrax scare outside a shuttered DC hospital. And she credits all of it to her NCCC service year. Laura Swier Kotelman served in AmeriCorps NCCC in 2001 — a year that turned out to be unlike any other. From mold remediation in Louisiana to the Special Olympics World Games in Alaska, Laura's service year opened doors she never expected and built skills she still uses every day. Now based in Sioux Falls, South Dakota — the only state without a service commission, a fact she's working to change — Laura volunteers by hosting international teaching interns in her home through her kids' Spanish immersion school. Her insight is quietly profound: you see your own community differently when you share it with someone experiencing it for the first time. Community isn't always a formal event. Sometimes it's gathering people around a table — wherever that table happens to be. #StillGettingThingsDone _______________________________________  🤝 This episode is part of a special series produced in partnership with 250&Beyond: Our American Story and our partners [https://www.nmcfs.org/250andbeyond]: The National Museum and Center for Service [https://www.nmcfs.org/] — A national organization developing a truly national museum and center dedicated to honoring and inspiring service in ALL its forms. Independent Sector [https://independentsector.org/] — The only national membership organization that brings together a diverse community of changemakers, nonprofits, foundations, and corporations working to strengthen civil society and ensure all people in the United States thrive. WETA [https://weta.org/]— Founded in 1961, WETA is the leading public broadcasting station in the nation's capital, serving their community with educational, cultural, news, and public affairs programs and services.  ________________________________________ AmeriCorps Connections lifts up real stories of AmeriCorps alumni — 100+ featured! Honest, unfiltered truth about national service. These alums aren't just reflecting — they're still getting things done! We believe these voices deserve to be heard, and we're just getting started! ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★ [https://patreon.com/AmeriCorpsConnectionsPodcast?utm_medium=unknown&utm_source=join_link&utm_campaign=creatorshare_creator&utm_content=copyLink]

250 & Beyond | The Work Doesn't Stop" | Libby McClayton

What happens when your AmeriCorps service year never really ends? Libby McClayton did two years as an AmeriCorps VISTA with the Office of the Mayor in Baltimore, then a third year as a State National member with Children's Hunger Alliance in Dayton, Ohio. The through line? Food. And she's still at it. Now on the board of the AmeriCorps Alum DC Chapter — one of the only 501(c)(3) alumni chapters in the country — Libby helps galvanize service-minded folks across the DMV. From packing thousands of Thanksgiving food boxes at the University of the District of Columbia to leading career fairs for the next generation of public servants, she's proof that the skills you build in service — rolling with chaos, pivoting, getting it done — travel with you for life. Libby also shares her philosophy on working alongside communities rather than swooping in to fix them. Active listening, curiosity, humility — and ditching the superhero cape. 🦸 #StillGettingThingsDone _______________________________________  🤝 This episode is part of a special series produced in partnership with 250&Beyond: Our American Story and our partners [https://www.nmcfs.org/250andbeyond]: The National Museum and Center for Service [https://www.nmcfs.org/] — A national organization developing a truly national museum and center dedicated to honoring and inspiring service in ALL its forms. Independent Sector [https://independentsector.org/] — The only national membership organization that brings together a diverse community of changemakers, nonprofits, foundations, and corporations working to strengthen civil society and ensure all people in the United States thrive. WETA [https://weta.org/]— Founded in 1961, WETA is the leading public broadcasting station in the nation's capital, serving their community with educational, cultural, news, and public affairs programs and services.  ________________________________________ AmeriCorps Connections lifts up real stories of AmeriCorps alumni — 100+ featured! Honest, unfiltered truth about national service. These alums aren't just reflecting — they're still getting things done! We believe these voices deserve to be heard, and we're just getting started! ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★ [https://patreon.com/AmeriCorpsConnectionsPodcast?utm_medium=unknown&utm_source=join_link&utm_campaign=creatorshare_creator&utm_content=copyLink]