AmeriCorps Position Open

MassLIFT-AmeriCorps position open for the 2016-17 service year

Grow Food Northampton is looking for a Community Engagement Coordinator to be shared with Hilltown Land Trust. These full-time AmeriCorps positions come with a living stipend, an education award, and other benefits. This is a full-time AmeriCorps positions requiring a minimum of 1,700 hours of service over 11 months. The 2016-17 MassLIFT program will run from August 29, 2016 – July 28, 2017.  Member application specifics, position descriptions, and information about MassLIFT-AmeriCorps and the organizations hosting members can be found on the Mount Grace Land Conservation Trust website: masslift.org. (Choose Join MassLIFT)

Community Engagement Coordinators (CEC) build the long-term capacity of their host sites to expand community engagement efforts, traditionally focused on conservation­ minded groups and populations, to include more diverse demographics and civic interests for the purpose of increasing public support for land conservation (including urban conservation and gardening efforts).

Specifically, the CEC will engage new constituencies in land conservation (including urban conservation and gardening efforts) by educating the public about the many social benefits of land conservation and by including them in projects and events that demonstrate how land conservation can address diverse community needs such as public health, economic development, education, poverty and hunger, neighborhood revitalization, and cultural decline. With volunteers, CECs have helped create community gardens at homeless shelters and food pantries, initiate and improve farmers’ markets, build wellness trails and gardens for hospitals, revitalize urban parks and greenways, create wheelchair accessible camping events, organize urban rivers water quality monitoring, build recreational trails with addiction recovery programs, organize urban birding clubs, and organize corporate volunteer projects. By engaging with diverse peoples and collaborating with community partners, they build bridges that reinforce the connection between land conservation and a sustainable social, economic, and environmental future for all people.

Grow Food Northampton’s CEC will, among other responsibilities, engage both volunteers and potential and current participants in our many Food Access programs, ensuring that the benefits of local agriculture on preserved farmland are understood and shared broadly in our community. In-depth engagement will position the CEC to participate meaningfully in improvements to the design and operation of these programs over the course of the service year.

Program Background

There are 30 MassLIFT – AmeriCorps positions being offered statewide through the Massachusetts Land Initiative for Tomorrow (MassLIFT), an AmeriCorps program managed by Mount Grace Land Conservation Trust. All members: carry out capacity building projects; educate or train individuals in environmental stewardship; manage community volunteers engaged in land conservation activities; and identify new people to participate in education, recreation, or service opportunities that address land conservation needs. Application specifics, position descriptions, and info about organizations hosting MassLIFT members can be found at masslift.org. We aim to fill all positions by July 29th. Interviews begin mid-May. Applications will be accepted until all positions are filled.

AmeriCorps programs provide equal service opportunities. MassLIFT will recruit and select persons in all positions to ensure a diverse and inclusive climate without regard to class, race, religion, ethnicity, sex, sexual orientation, gender expression, age, disability, veteran status, color, political affiliation, creed, national origin, marital status, or any other status as protected by federal, state, and local laws. We encourage applications from individuals with disabilities and will provide reasonable accommodations for interviews and service upon request.

The Massachusetts Land Initiative for Tomorrow (MassLIFT) was established in 2010 under the leadership of Mount Grace Land Conservation Trust of Athol, Massachusetts. This AmeriCorps program is a collaborative effort of regional conservation organizations (including urban conservation and gardening efforts) seeking to increase their capacity to engage with more people and do more community conservation projects across Massachusetts. MassLIFT AmeriCorps is a grant program contingent on federal funding through the Corporation of National and Community Service.