Dearest RARE Family,
I sure hope this message finds each of you wonderful individuals happy and healthy. With the holiday season upon us, well, I can’t help but take pause to celebrate how far the RARE AmeriCorps Program has come in the last year. That’s right, it’s time for a little sharing after a year filled with challenges, successes, and heaps of programmatic growth.
Service in rural Oregon doesn’t come easy, especially in the midst of a global pandemic. Just imagine arriving to your host site and never getting the chance to connect in-person with your supervisor, the community, and fellow members of your cohort. We literally had to rewrite the book, and it was only due to having a dedicated team, cohort, and crew of supervisors that we were able to find success. Last year was rife with unprecedented challenges, every one of which presented an opportunity for growth and development. I stand here today proud to say the RARE AmeriCorps Program is leaps and bounds beyond where we were just a year ago.
So what looks different at the RARE AmeriCorps Program? Pretty much everything! To start, we have a completely revamped and more equitable placement process; are now offering a new faculty led course focused on engaging with diverse communities; have created and rolled out a RARE Alumni Mentorship Program; have a new and improved member training and support strategy; are fully engaged in an equity planning process; and let us not forget about the increased levels of engagement we are offering our site supervisors and community partners. And this is just the beginning of the list of significant programmatic changes we have made. Here’s to turning a page and opening a new chapter in the book of RARE.
Of course, it wouldn’t be possible to make these programmatic changes without adequate staff capacity, which is another thing that looks a bit different here at the RARE AmeriCorps Program. Not only have we hired a new Program Assistant, Kate Coenen, but we also are gearing up to hire a 2nd Program Coordinator. I am beyond excited to see what we can accomplish in the years ahead with an expanded team backing the RARE AmeriCorps Program!
I sure hope you can see that we are striving to make the RARE AmeriCorps Program the best we can be. This work doesn’t come easy, but we remain committed to the cause… to listening… to making changes every step of the way. Onward and upward!!
Titus Tomlinson, Years 13 & 16
RARE Program Director