Opinion: We should all welcome the bipartisan push to expand AmeriCorps

My first job out of college was in AmeriCorps in Austin. I tutored elementary students in a Title I school, working to bring them up to grade-level reading. AmeriCorps, which turned 25 last year, began with 20,000 members — mostly recent college graduates — serving 1,000 communities. By this March, the national service program had an alumni network of more than 1.1 million and 75,000 active members serving over 20,000 communities.

Now the Senate has introduced the Cultivating Opportunity and Response to the Pandemic through Service (CORPS) Act, which would significantly expand the AmeriCorps program. I can think of a hundred reasons why the bill should pass. Here are just a few.

First, the bill would increase members’ stipend to 175% of the federal poverty line, raising the annual living allowance from roughly $14,000 to $20,000. This important change would attract more volunteers and provide them a greater economic safety net.

In my own AmeriCorps program, participation has steadily declined in recent years due to the low-paying stipend, meaning the program can’t reach and teach nearly as many students as it did in the past. In my cohort, we had 106 members serving 2,212 students. The following year, 88 members served 2,028 students. Last year, just 55 members served 814 students.

I recently spoke with my AmeriCorps director, who believes that a prohibitively low stipend denies many young people the transformative personal and professional experience that comes from a year or two in national service. We should be making it easier, not harder, for people to serve.

Second, the bill would double the number of AmeriCorps positions from 75,000 to 150,000 in the first year, and further expand the Corps to 200,000 and then 250,000 in ensuing years. This may not seem like a big deal, but it’s huge.

When the Corporation for National and Community Service announced a $3 million grant to tribal AmeriCorps programs in 2014, for example, the number of AmeriCorps members serving tribal communities increased by 41 percent. That meant dozens more members working with residents on the Gila River Reservation, helping the elderly and disabled on the Hoopa Indian Reservation, and serving in preschools on the Red Lake Reservation.

Third, volunteering can be a pathway to employment. One study found that volunteering was significantly associated with a 27 percent increase in finding employment. Another study by the Center for Economic and Policy Research analyzed data from 2008-2011 — during a recession — and found that volunteering increased overall likelihood of finding a job by almost 7 percentage points.

Lastly, AmeriCorps is an opportunity for people to come together, something our country desperately needs right now. It’s reminiscent of President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal program, which offered Americans a lifeline during the Great Depression. The federal Civilian Conservation Corps provided employment to millions of young men who shaped the national and state park system we know today.

Today we need something much like the New Deal. The CORPS Act was introduced by a dozen legislators from both parties and all walks of life in an effort to expand national service and help the country recover from the harmful effects of COVID-19.

Our motto in AmeriCorps was “getting things done for America.” It was a slogan we said at our swearing-in ceremony, and one that we harkened back to throughout the year.

Now it is time we once again find ways to get things done for America. One of these would be passing the CORPS Act and increasing funding for an entity that could help both its members and the thousands of people they serve. Let’s get things done.

Olson is the assistant director of Policy Research at the Institute for Urban Policy Research and Analysis at the University of Texas, and a public voices fellow of The OpEd Project.