AmeriCorps Connections

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
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 🤝 This episode is part of a special series produced in partnership with 250&Beyond: Our American Story and our partners:

The National Museum and Center for Service — A national organization developing a truly national museum and center dedicated to honoring and inspiring service in ALL its forms.

Independent Sector — 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 — 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!

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:

The National Museum and Center for Service — A national organization developing a truly national museum and center dedicated to honoring and inspiring service in ALL its forms.

Independent Sector — 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 — 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!

What does it look like when a veteran heals — and then turns around to help the next one?
David Konkler served in the AmeriCorps VETCO program in Tacoma, Washington, supporting veterans transitioning out of military life. But his service didn't stop there. He co-founded Nine Line Veteran Services, an outdoor nature-based peer support program that brings veterans together through hiking, camping, and yes — a beloved event called "Suns Out, Guns Out."

David shares what happens when a group of guarded, "snarky veterans" spend a day on a private gun range together. By the end? They're swapping stories, laughing, competing — and opening up in ways they haven't in years. It's mental health support that doesn't feel like mental health support.

The most powerful moment: watching a veteran "graduate" from the program and say I want to give back now too. The ripple effect is real.

"It's okay not to be okay. But we have to make sure we're doing things to guide us toward the lighter side." — David Konkler

#StillGettingThingsDone
_______________________________________
 🤝 This episode is part of a special series produced in partnership with 250&Beyond: Our American Story and our partners:

The National Museum and Center for Service — A national organization developing a truly national museum and center dedicated to honoring and inspiring service in ALL its forms.

Independent Sector — 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 — 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!

What happens when you spend your life moving — and you bring your commitment to service with you every single time?

Najla Munshower served in the AmeriCorps Veteran Leader Corps in 2012-2013 as the spouse of an active duty service member in Washington State. What she built there — coordination programs for veterans in transition — became part of the framework for the USO Pathfinder Transitions Program, which is still running today.

Since then, she's moved through Europe, North Carolina, and now Indiana. And everywhere she goes, she finds people who need what she knows: how to navigate VA benefits, how to support military families, how to help someone who doesn't know help is available ask for it.

One story stands out: a volunteer food bank run she helped organize that eventually led to an on-base food pantry for lower-enlisted families who couldn't always afford groceries. The quiet, invisible needs that nobody talks about — that's where Najla shows up.

"AmeriCorps afforded me the ability to not just enter into community with intent — but to grow the community." — Najla Munshower
#StillGettingThingsDone
_______________________________________
 🤝 This episode is part of a special series produced in partnership with 250&Beyond: Our American Story and our partners:

The National Museum and Center for Service — A national organization developing a truly national museum and center dedicated to honoring and inspiring service in ALL its forms.

Independent Sector — 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 — 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!

Shawn Durnen will tell you that national service saved his life. And then he built an organization so it could do the same for others.

A veteran and AmeriCorps VETCO alum, Shawn is the founder and CEO of Nine Line Veteran Services — built from the ground up over 15 years. His service year in Washington State sparked everything: grant writing, community coordination, housing support, and one-on-one conversations with veterans navigating some of the hardest moments of their lives.
Now Shawn chairs the Greater Pierce County Continuum of Care under HUD's homeless initiatives, volunteers at community events with his family, and advocates loudly for veterans to use the benefits they've earned. His challenge to fellow vets: if you don't use them, they disappear — and your hesitation is the same hesitation your fellow service member has. Use them. For your family. For the next one.

His service philosophy is simple and loud: be a voice for the voiceless. Civic engagement IS community service. And it takes people who've been on the ground to make legislators understand what policy actually looks like in real life.

"Selfless, targeted service through kindness and community — that's a labor of love." — Shawn Durnen

#StillGettingThingsDone
_______________________________________
 🤝 This episode is part of a special series produced in partnership with 250&Beyond: Our American Story and our partners:

The National Museum and Center for Service — A national organization developing a truly national museum and center dedicated to honoring and inspiring service in ALL its forms.

Independent Sector — 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 — 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!

Happy Earth Day!  🌍🌎🌏
Alex Schwartz has a philosophy for volunteering that he picked up from a hospice care essay he read on a spring break service trip in college — and it's stuck with him through every service experience since.

Step 1: Show up.
Step 2: Do what you can with what you have.
Step 3: Be ready to leave.

From AmeriCorps NCCC building Habitat for Humanity homes in Montana, to disaster relief after California's Camp Fire, to trail restoration in Iowa, to Boys and Girls Club work in Utah — Alex has served across more communities than most people visit in a lifetime. Each time, he brought those three steps with him.

Now settled in Minnesota and just starting to volunteer at his local youth center, Alex reflects on what it means to build community as a newcomer — and how showing up to serve is the fastest way to feel like you belong somewhere.

His closing thought: Tikkun Olam.
Repair the world. Leave it better than you found it. Ask the community what "better" looks like — then do what you can. Happy Earth Day!  🌍🌎🌏
#StillGettingThingsDone
_______________________________________
 🤝 This episode is part of a special series produced in partnership with 250&Beyond: Our American Story and our partners:

The National Museum and Center for Service — A national organization developing a truly national museum and center dedicated to honoring and inspiring service in ALL its forms.

Independent Sector — 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 — 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!

What if volunteering looked like helping someone turn a lifelong dream into a board game? 🎲

Rok Locksley has been living in an Airstream with his family for four years, traveling all 48 states — and everywhere he lands, he brings community with him. Sparked by his AmeriCorps service in Macomb, Illinois (yes, the birthplace of Monopoly — and that story gets wild), Rok now runs volunteer game design sessions across the country, helping people bring their ideas to life through play.

From park programming to Kickstarter-funded games, Rok makes the case that games aren't just fun — they're how communities build real connections. And it all started with a service year that gave him the spark.

Oh, and we get into the untold history of Monopoly — turns out it was designed as a cooperative game to show the pitfalls of unchecked capitalism. Sound familiar? 🎲
#StillGettingThingsDone
_______________________________________
 🤝 This episode is part of a special series produced in partnership with 250&Beyond: Our American Story and our partners:

The National Museum and Center for Service — A national organization developing a truly national museum and center dedicated to honoring and inspiring service in ALL its forms.

Independent Sector — 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 — 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!

Three years later, she still goes back to volunteer. That's how deep service runs for Shelbie Simmons.
Shelbie served as an American Connection Corps Fellow in Clay County, Kentucky — one of the top 25 poorest counties in the US — tackling digital equity, broadband access, and literacy in a place that's often overlooked. She built coalitions across three counties, co-created Little Free Libraries, taught senior digital literacy classes, and launched a "Seniors for Seniors" program pairing high schoolers with senior citizens. (Miss Helen now takes selfies. 📱)

Today Shelbie works as a philanthropy officer at Reset 180, a nonprofit supporting women leaving human trafficking situations — and she's still going back to Eastern Kentucky at least once a year to serve.

Her message is simple but powerful: you don't need an official name tag to volunteer. Helping a neighbor, sharing a skill, showing up — that's the spirit of service. And it doesn't have to be grand to matter.

"You don't have to be an AmeriCorps member to embody the pledge." — Shelbie Simmons
#StillGettingThingsDone
_______________________________________
 🤝 This episode is part of a special series produced in partnership with 250&Beyond: Our American Story and our partners:

The National Museum and Center for Service — A national organization developing a truly national museum and center dedicated to honoring and inspiring service in ALL its forms.

Independent Sector — 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 — 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!

Shayna Canty didn't know what she was doing with her life — and then AmeriCorps happened. Now she's a two-time state service commissioner, a national Youth 250 representative, and one of the most energetic advocates for young people in community engagement you'll ever hear.

Based in the Pocono Mountains and working as communications coordinator for her local Meals on Wheels, Shayna talks about what it really looks like to grow a life of service from a single volunteer coordinator role. From career fairs to Girl Scout events to statewide forums on youth civic engagement — she's building the pipeline, one conversation at a time.

Her big idea: service is an "open definition." You don't need a formal structure. Knock on your neighbor's door. Walk a kid to school. Share a skill. Show up. Self-activation is a superpower.

For Gen Z and younger — feeling like the world is too big to change? Shayna's got something to say about that. 👊
"You never know where volunteerism is going to take you." — Shayna Canty
#StillGettingThingsDone

_______________________________________
 🤝 This episode is part of a special series produced in partnership with 250&Beyond: Our American Story and our partners:

The National Museum and Center for Service — A national organization developing a truly national museum and center dedicated to honoring and inspiring service in ALL its forms.

Independent Sector — 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 — 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!

What does service look like 25 years after your AmeriCorps year? For Addie Madchen, it never stopped.

In this special edition of AmeriCorps Connections — part of our 250&Beyond: Our American Story series — Addie shares what brought her from Connecticut to Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and why she never left. From coat drives and AIDS runs with City Year to teaching jazz guitar to kids in her community, Addie's service has taken a lot of shapes. But the throughline is the same: show up for people, share what you have, and look for the helpers.

Addie opens up about a raw moment during a 12-hour MLK Day of Service — flat on the floor of an empty school, exhausted and questioning the point — and how one act of service from a colleague changed everything. She also reflects on identity, belonging, and what happens when people who've been told to distrust each other end up serving side by side.
This one is a mic drop moment. 🎤
#StillGettingThingsDone
________________________________________
🤝 This episode is part of a special series produced in partnership with 250&Beyond: Our American Story and our partners:

The National Museum and Center for Service — A national organization developing a truly national museum and center dedicated to honoring and inspiring service in ALL its forms.

Independent Sector — 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 — 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!