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October 22-23, 2009
Lee University, Cleveland, TN
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National Campus Compact and 35 State Campus Compacts provide advocacy, consultations, training,
technical assistance, resources, research, funding, awards, capacity building, partnerships, and
leadership development to promote civic engagement, service-learning, and community service in
higher education. TNCC is an independent coalition organized to increase statewide collaboration
and leverage national resources.
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NATIONAL CAMPUS COMPACT INDICATORS OF

ENGAGEMENT THEMES

^ THEME ONE: Institutional Culture

^ THEME TWO: Curriculum & Pedagogy
^ THEME THREE: Faculty Roles & Rewards
^ THEME FOUR: Mechanisms and Resources
^ THEME FIVE: Community-Campus Exchange
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Project Goal I: Create and expand community service and service-learning

infrastructure in Tennessee colleges and universities. Tasks and Activities:
^ Use the Furco Rubric to assess the levels of infrastructure in all TNCC member
institutions
^ Promote administrative and faculty action necessary to create/approve a
permanent organizational structure to carry out responsibilities for sustained
service-learning and community service activity
^ Create documents to assist the institution in framing organizational
infrastructure (including such documents as: mission statements, vision
statements, staff job descriptions, short/long-term plans or strategic plans and
institutional goals, inter-department agreements, administrative and faculty
responsibilities, training curriculum, etc.)
^ Design service-learning curriculum materials and a system for sustained faculty
training
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Project Goal II: Create and expand mutually beneficial college-community

partnerships that link university resources and needs with community
resources and needs. Tasks and Activities:
^ Provide guidelines and resources that facilitate community partnership
development at TNCC member campuses
^ Expand federal work study activities through member campuses
^ Create and expand sustainable service programs (e.g. mentoring,
tutoring, leadership training, service- learning, etc.) that connect higher
education students with at-risk K-12 students in both in-school and out-
of-school settings
^ Provide on-line resources to support community partner development
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Project Goal III: Develop training programs that will

ensure sustainability of high quality service-learning
on TNCC member campuses. Tasks and Activities:
^ Provide on-line and print resources to support faculty
knowledge and skills in service-learning pedagogy
^ Develop and implement Faculty Service-Learning
Workshops
^ Provide support for sustainable faculty development
on TNCC member campuses
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In Year III of the VISTA Project, TNCC must:

1. Significantly upgrade VAD clarity.
2. Start to require greater specificity.
3. The goals, activities and steps must be building something sustainable
for somebody, there must be a clear link to growing student civic
engagement or growing SL infrastructure or growing TNCC
capacityǥand there needs to be some verifiable measurement.
4. To some extent, (in a few cases a great extent) institutions have hosted
VISTAs for their own purposes.
5. TNCC gave members lots of flexibility the first and second time
aroundǥbut now itǯs time for host a VISTA for TNCC reasons.
6. TNCC needs to move the resource to another institution if necessary.
7. DzTNCC will be closely monitored for this coming year.dz (JH/10/09/09)


 

Session Overview
^ VISTA and TNCC
^ Project Review & Approval
^ Site Review & Approval
^ Concept Papers and VADs
^ Reporting
^ Cost-Sharing
^ Q&A
VISTA & TNCC
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Corporation for National and Community Service

(an agency of the U.S. Government)

^ Senior Corps (RSVP, FGP and SCP)

^ Learn & Serve America (School & Community-based)
^ AmeriCorps
1. State & National
2. NCCC
3. VISTA (indirect serviceǥcapacity-builders)


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CNCS has occasionally challenged the development of Compact

projects by suggesting these projects lack a clear poverty focus.
The way to counter these challenges is to ensure that we can:
1. Document real (measurable) growth in student civic
engagement
2. Track student engagement to poverty-focused initiatives
in the community
3. Document real (measurable) growth in the
implementation of SL methodology by faculty
4. Establish a civic engagement baseline for each
institution (a part of each VISTA memberǯs VAD*)

* VISTA Assignment Description



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How would this proposed VISTA activity:

^ Grow and sustain higher education student civic
engagement?
^ Grow and sustain service-learning in higher
education institutions?
^ Develop institutional community service/civic
engagement infrastructure?
^ Help build greater TNCC capacity/infrastructure?



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^ The TNCC VISTA project is an important piece of TNCCǯs early

development. Eventually, this federal resource will be moved to other
community initiatives.
^ TNCC must focus on how VISTA members can contribute to TNCC
infrastructure while they are assisting their individual institutions in
developing service-learning infrastructure and other related capacities.
^ Ultimately, TNCC will become the source to which all TN higher
education institutions turn for guidance and expertise in the area of
student civic engagement, service-learning pedagogy, community
partnership development and the like.
^ We see many early examples of how individual VISTA members are
contributing to their host institutionsǥbut few examples of how they
are contributing to the TNCC itself.
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Each institution should consider TNCC when developing a Concept Paper and VAD.
How does the VISTA service help TNCC? Think about a contribution that the
VISTA can perform that can benefit the central office for replication to other
TNCC member institutions for example:
A Infrastructure templates/Human resource templates/Financial
management templates/Community development templates/Standard
operating procedures manual/Training manuals
A Marketing brochures, flyers, advertisements/Website links/Best practice
publications/Funding prospects
A Letters to community partners/Lessons in Liabilities/Risk
Management/Newsletters/Event management/Special projects/New ideas
for research/Student reflections
A Service-learning syllabi/Recruitment of faculty volunteers for faculty-to-
faculty service-learning mentoring program/Other


  
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Project Review
&
Approval


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^ Poverty-related community need

^ Scope of the plan (capacity-building Ȃ sustainability)
^ Project/site ability to manage
^ Equitable distribution of resource across projects
^ Alignment with CNCS Strategic Priorities
The CNCS TN State Office allocates a number of Dzservice-
yearsdz to projects with the expectation that those
resources will be fully used. From that point on, it is
up to the project to determine how best to use those
resources.


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^ If TNCC manages well, Mani and the Advisory Council

will be able to make most decisions internally.
Management challenges include:
^ Producing less than allocated Ȃ may result in a loss of
resources to other projects
^ Heavy initial production Ȃ may result in the State
Office denying new applications and/or the
reenrollment of current VISTA members.


Site and Member

Review and Approval


    
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ǥgenerally consistent with ǮProjectǯ approval criteria:

^ The scope of institutional need (local, regional or statewide) as

described and explained in the Concept Paper
^ The extent to which the proposed VISTA member activities make
sense as a solution to the need.
^ The extent to which there is a clear plan for long-term
community or institutional sustainability.
^ The quality/clarity of the VAD (clear benchmarks and target
dates)

(Cont.)


    
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^ The level of project/host/community support

proposed for the VISTA.
^ The site track-record for adherence to federal
regulations, CNCS policy and for the management of
and support to VISTA members.
^ The extent to which the site has demonstrated an
appropriate use of VISTA member services in the past
(i.e. capacity-building, especially the extent to which
sites and TNCC are sustaining or benefitting from the
work of former VISTAs.


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Step I

^ To the extent possible, we want to help projects avoid recruiting

slots we ultimately canǯt approve. To achieve this end, we will
limit our review of member applications to only those slots for
which we have pre-approved a Concept Paper. Approval
decisions will be based on both the quality of the proposal and
the state allocation.
^ The overall impact on poverty in Tennessee can be maximized
only if we are able to fill all allocated slots. Because not all
projects/sites will be able to successfully recruit for every
approved slot, approving more than the minimum number of
CPs/VADs per training is a necessary strategy.


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Step 2:

^ Step 2 is the process of reviewing all successfully submitted

member applications and approving an appropriate number
based on our allocation. If all approved projects/sites recruit
successfully, the number of member applications may exceed the
number we can send to training (PSO). In that event, we will
rely on the site review criteria (plus the strengths of the
individual applicants) to identify the applications having the
greatest potential impact on poverty in Tennessee.
^ CPs/VADs are accepted only from TNCC
^ Applicants that are not approved for one PSO may request to be
held over for consideration in a future PSO.


Concept Papers
& VADs


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^ There should NOT be staff-type or direct-svc-type activities in

the CP and VADs. A VISTA should NOT monitor, coordinate,
maintain or be a documentarian. To Ǯsome extentǯ, a VISTA may
do these during initial implementation stages..but the idea is for
the institution (and/or partners) to take it over (sustainability).
Thus, the VISTA SHOULD be building monitoring systems,
developing coordination plans, creating record systems, etc.
^ Institutions should not see the VISTA member as ©
 their new
capacity rather than using him or her to ©
 


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Ǯnon-VISTAǯ capacity. Ask yourself, Dzwho will do these when
VISTAs are gone.dz The VAD should help the institution and VISTA
member understand that ultimately, it is a local responsibility Ȃ
and that local capacity must be created.


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Soǥmake certain that VISTA members:

^ Do 'indirect' (capacity-building) serviceǥNOT direct service
^ Follow a well-developed VAD (w/measurable and clearly defined goals
and objectives)
^ Do not have staff roles as a VISTAǯs primary responsibilities (i.e.
coordinators, managers, clerks). Proposing a staff position to
coordinate part of a program is not an appropriate role for a VISTA
^ Serve full-time (i.e. no school or employment)
^ Have an on-site supervisor that is aware of the 'basic' VISTA
policies/regulations

NOTE: The CP and/or VAD should clarify "Who will do this when the VISTA
is gone?Dz


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ǥand
^ Growth of service-learning at your institutions is critical
^ Make sure that VISTA members are being programmed to build
tracking systems to measure growth in SL and student civic
engagement (if tracking systems are not already in place).
^ Make sure the VAD activities/steps are clear and well-defined.
VISTA members must know the specifics of what needs to be
done, by when and who is ultimately responsible. Activities and
Steps calling for a VISTA to Dzassistǥhelpǥwork withǥdz etc. will
ultimately lead to confusion and limited accomplishments.


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^ A strong CP will provide data on the current number of faculty

implementing SL methodology, current number of students
engaged in SL as part of their curriculum, current number of
sustaining community partners, etc. If this information is not
known by the institution, then the collection of such data should
be a part of the proposal and VAD. In other words, CPs should
either say that this information is not known and propose that
the VISTA develop a means of measuring itǥor the CP should
provide it as supportive data (this is not necessarily related to
the Furco Rubric).
^ CPs/VADs for a 2nd or 3rd service year must build on the
accomplishments of previous VISTA service. The duplication of
prior service activities is a sign of wasted resources.
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Scenario: The ultimate SL goal is to have SL methodology become a

standard part of all teacher preparation programs.
ǥa VISTA could:
^ Research and disseminate information (especially within the
College of Education) about teacher prep programs/courses that
teach SL methodology
^ Conduct SL methodology focus groups with faculty
^ Design a SL curriculum for various K-12 levels
^ Design a SL curriculum that could be a week or 2-week long
segment of existing K-12 methodology courses
^ Create or update an existing teacher prep SL methodology
syllabus


Reporting


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DzTNCCdz Quarterly Reporting
^ Structure the narrative to aggregate all TNCC VISTA member
accomplishments for the reporting period.
^ Concentrate on impact rather than activity.
A Example: It would be more helpful to report that a VISTA
established 4 sustained SL partnerships with local nonprofits than
to report that the VISTA made 30 presentations to local nonprofits
or that s/he developed and distributed 10,000 SL brochures. We
want to be able to begin answering the 'so what' questions.
^ To date, there has been several hundred thousand federal tax
dollars spent in moving TNCC toward full sustainability...and
helping individual institutions develop partnerships and grow
student engagement in their communities. How can VISTA
accomplishments (impact) be quantified so that we have a sense
of value for the federal investment?


 
 

DzSitedz Reporting (designed primarily by TNCC)

A When reporting community partnership
development or grant funding, provide
organization names, locations, dates, etc.
A Specify data (i.e. not Ǯmanyǯ or Ǯseveralǯ, etc.) and
fully describe particularly impressive or unique
accomplishments.
A Report/explain when VISTA member service
accomplishments become sustainable.
A Include VISTA member input Ȃ but donǯt relinquish
control of reporting to VISTAs.


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DzMemberdz Reporting (designed by TNCC & institution)

^ Include accomplishment details on VAD documentǥcumulative

as the service year progresses
^ Submit the completed VAD during the 12th month of service
^ Future Plans Forms (on-line in @   

): The
VISTA member initiatesǥform is open 90 days prior to Close of
Service.
^ The CNCS State Office recommends that every VISTA Dzsitedz
supervisor provide their President [1] a copy of the VISTAǯs
completed VAD and [2] a memberǯs written narrative reflection
of their service year, accomplishments, challenges and
suggestions. (tangible evidence of TNCC investment)


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Cost-Sharing


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^ Cost-sharing expands available resources and is

strongly encouraged, particularly in projects wishing
to have AmeriCorps*VISTA resources beyond the
third year.
^ As a cost-share project your organization contributes
the living allowance Ȃ current, $10,296.00 per year
for each VISTA member.
^ TNCC requires that the $10,296.00 check be sent to
TNCC/Lipscomb University BEFORE the VISTA
candidate is approved for training (PSO).


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Q & A
Jerry Herman - Mani Hull
And Participants