Literacy*AmeriCorps New Orleans

Planning and attending service projects comprise a central part of a Literacy*AmeriCorps member's service year. All members are required to engineer a community service project during their year of service. Additionally, members are required to participate in at least one service project per month, but full time members are encouraged to participate in two or more.

October 2008

Gretna Heritage Festival, Rebuilding Together, Sculpture Garden Clean Up

In October, Literacy AmeriCorps kicked off the year with three service project. The first took place at the Gretna Heritage Festival where member help the YES! Learning Center publicizes their westbank location and conduct community outreach. In addition, to helping, the community learn about services and the literacy issue in New Orleans members got to listen to good music and eat some great food! The second event was held in partnership with Rebuilding Together New Orleans. Members helped rebuild two different homes. They worked on everything from scraping paint to priming the siding on a house. Rebuilding Together had people working on over 25 different houses around the city. Finally, members headed out to the Sydney and Walda Besthoff Sculpture Garden at City Park and helped out by pulling weeds, planting, and cutting down some very overgrown ginger. The garden is maintained by volunteers only and appreciated the help. When they were done, Members were treated to free admission to the New Orleans Museum of Art.

June 2008

North Rampart Community Center Clean Up

On Saturday, June 14^th Literacy* AmeriCorps came ready to work and help the North Rampart Community Center, located where St. Mark’s Community Center used to be before Katrina, get back up and running. They painted numerous wall and sorted through years and years of old files hoping to clear space in what is now just a file room for the eventual creation of a music room for the after school program and even an adult music class. This was the second year that Literacy* AmeriCorps members work with N. Rampart. In the fall of 2006, they helped move all of those same files from the Gym to the classrooms.

May 2008

Bayou Boogaloo, GED Graduation, Summer Reading Kickoff

On Saturday, May 24, Literacy* AmeriCorps members helped man tables at the Bayou Boogaloo festival for the New Orleans Public Library and the YMCA’s Educational Services program YES!. Members distributed flyers, talk to community members about the programs, helped recruit students and volunteers, and heard some great New Orleans music.

At the end of May, Literacy* AmeriCorps members had the distinct pleasure of assisting the first ever Regional GED Graduation Ceremony held on Saturday, May 31 at Loyola University. This event was the first of its kind held in both St. Bernard and Orleans parishes since the storm three years ago. Over 80 GED graduates participated in the ceremony and were honored by Keynote speaker Irma Thomas. Literacy* AmeriCorps members assisted by helping graduates line up, ushering guest, working behind the scenes, setting up and breaking down the event. All members involved commented on how move and honored they were to participate.

Members also helped the New Orleans Public Library kick off their summer reading program in the afternoon on May 31. One member even dressed like Clifford the big red dog to help children of all ages gear up for a productive summer reading season.

April 2008

Beacon of Hope

On Saturday, April 19^th hardworking Literacy* AmeriCorps members tackled a post-Katrina urban jungle. They worked for an entire day to help clean up an overgrown lot for a homeowner in the Lakeview neighborhood. Working in conjunction with the Beacon of Hope organization, members chopped, weeded, and raked up over 22 bags of urban jungle overgrowth. This service project was especially meaningful because it was organized my members Adrian McGrath, a long time resident of Lakeview, who survived the storm in the area. Helping him clean up his own neighborhood was truly amazing.

March 2008

Earthfest and Sheriff Gusman's Easter Egg Hunt

Earthfest, an annual event at the New Orleans Zoo focuses on improving the earth and highlighting organizations in the city with this goal, was a well attended event at the New Orleans zoo. Organizations around New Orleans set up tables with information and activities. AmeriCorps members helped to run the table for the Children’s Room of the New Orleans Public Library and R.U.B.A.R.B. Bike Shop. All in attendance had a great time. Also on March 22, 2008, AmeriCorps members volunteered their time at the fly for Sheriff Gusman's annual Easter Egg Hunt. Members volunteered by painting children’s faces for the day.

February 2008

Martin Luther King Day of Service and Black History Month

For the Martin Luther King Day of National Service Literacy* AmeriCorps members helped support a variety of programs throughout the Greater New Orleans area ranging from building a deck at Fredrick Douglass high school to helping map the St. Roch Neighborhood to participating in the Celebration of Cultures event held at Lakeside mall. During these events, members were able to help carry on MLK's dedication to service and see the variety of projects occurring throughout the city.

Also in February, Literacy* AmeriCorps members participated in a variety of Black History events organized by the African American Resource Center at the New Orleans Public Library. On Saturday February 15th, 2008, members met at the Alvar Library Branch in the Bywater for Family Day. Members worked at face painting booths, watched African Dancers, and heard a traditional story teller. Members also participated in a genealogy workshop held at the Main Branch of the New Orleans Public Library.

January 2008

RUBARB Bike Shop

AmeriCorps members spent a chilly Saturday morning and afternoon at Rusted Up Beyond All Recognition Bikes (R.U.B.A.R.B.), a bike shop where you can earn a bike, hang out, fix your bike, make art, volunteer, build a bike, and help others. Members spent the day stripping bikes, working with local kids who were much more knowledgeable about bikes than us, and making baskets out of old bike tires. The beauty about R.U.B.A.R.B. is that it is a community bike shop, meaning all are welcome. It gives kids a place to go and something productive to do where their hard work goes into something tangible. Literacy* AmeriCorps New Orleans is very lucky to have had member Liz Lichtman who was one of the co-founders of R.U.B.A.R.B. provide us with this amazing service project.

December 2007

Book Give Away at the Children's Room

Literacy* AmeriCorps members got into the holiday spirit by wrapping and then giving away 140 children's books at the children’s room in the main branch of the New Orleans Public Library on Saturday, December 15th, 2007. During the book give away party, members read holiday themed books, helped kids make pop-up art holiday cards for their loved ones, and enjoyed some festive cookies, punch, and pretzels.

November 2007

One Book One New Orleans

Throughout the fall Literacy* AmeriCorps work to support the One Book One New Orleans project, which tries to gets the greater New Orleans community to focus on literacy and connect to each other through sharing in reading one book. Members participated in and brought their students to variety of events throughout the city. One event that was a focus occurred on Thursday, November 15th, 2007. Members attended the “Meet the Authors” event at Dillard University, celebrating the 2007 one book Coming Out the Door for the Ninth Ward, by the Nine Times Social and Pleasure Club. Literacy AmeriCorps members also incorporated the book into lessons with their students. The nine times pleasure and social club, the authors of the book, celebrated the end of 2007 One Book One New Orleans, with their annual Second Line parade. Literacy* AmeriCorps members and their students participated in the parade as well!

October 2007

YES! Learning Center Library Review

AmeriCorps members met early on Saturday, October 27th, 2007 to spend the day helping the YMCA’s Education Services (YES!) learning center located at the main branch of the New Orleans Public Library organizing books and materials to be used for tutoring the students at the center. This included determining whether the materials were out of date and helping to categorize the materials so the site could access them in a more effective manner.