It's official!

Today was my first day of work for the White House Council for Community Solutions. First days of new jobs and internships are usually consumed by orientation materials, paperwork, and a lot of catching up in terms of getting to know background information and context. Today was a little bit different.

I've never worked in government before -- let alone the federal government! -- so today I received an official badge, property of the U.S. Government. The morning logistics included taking an oath to swear to support and defend the Constitution. The Office fo Personnel Management has a neat historical description of why federal employees take the oath as a sign of "clear, publicly sworn accountability."

The Council is administered under the Corporation for National and Community Service, which is the federal agency that engages Americans in service through AmeriCorps and other programs. The Corporation's broad mission is to improve lives, strengthen communities, and foster civic engagement through service and volunteering across the country, so it makes sense that the Council would be placed under its umbrella. Both entities champion local community efforts, aim to strengthen public-private partnerships, and foster collaboration as much as possible.

Today wasn't just my first day. It was also the first day of Robert Velasco, II, new Acting CEO of the Corporation. He was previously the Chief Operating Officer at the agency, and this afternoon, he addressed what was essentially an optional all-agency gathering. The budget compromise just a few months ago felt fresh in my mind attending the meeting, especially since Learn & Serve America was completely defunded as a part of that negotiation.

The Corporation for National and Community Service may be a small federal agency, but its mission is resounding. Revitalizing communities across America -- from natural disaster-stricken Joplin to manmade disaster-stricken Detroit -- will take all citizens and all sectors working together.

Schools Plus

This great GOOD piece on "The Coming Paradigm Shift in Education Reform" opens with the reality that "the reform conversation usually focuses on school-centered solutions." The article goes on to explore the efforts of the “Futures of School Reform,” a three-year-old collaboration of 20 prominent education experts who have come to the consensus that our nation's schools will never achieve the goal of universal student proficiency until non-school factors are taken into account.

There are so many false dichotomies in education policy debates. The best example was the debate about two manifestoes written during the 2008 presidential campaign: The Broader, Bolder Approach and The Education Equality Project. Both manifestoes targeted the same goal of improving educational outcomes particularly for students from disadvantaged backgrounds, but neither piece cleanly aligned with political parties – a typical occurrence in the educational world. The distinctive difference between the two proposals was on the question of whether schools should take on some of the responsibilities generally left to community organizations and social work agencies such as health care and psychological services.

Although I did not realize it at the time, my own journey to this work began with community solutions. Seven summers ago, I had the opportunity to teach at SuperKids Camp, a literacy and enrichment camp for inner-city third and fourth grade students in the City of Baltimore. SuperKids is run by the Parks & People Foundation, which works with the city and its school system to provide summer learning opportunities to combat summer slide and provide low-income children with enrichment opportunities they may not otherwise experience.

My SuperKids volunteering experience set me on the career trajectory that led me here today -- exploring Chicago's neighborhoods through community service, studying school redesign and urban education policy in the American Studies Program at Northwestern, and beginning to build university-community relationships through asset-based community development at NU's Center for Civic Engagement and HKS' Student Public Service Collaborative.

Effective cross-sector partnerships exist to support youth across the country, and I'm sure I'll learn more about them as the summer progresses, but for now, it's important to remember the reality of where we are right now:

Four million youth in America are disconnected from school and work. The social safety nets supporting these young adults are so often fragmented and tunnel-visioned. Any game-changing efforts in this arena must integrate existing community assets and resources across sectors more effectively to connect young adults to education and career pathways.

We must challenge communities across America to convene and collaborate to reconfigure how organizations function together and challenge all Americans to engage in sustained and meaningful community service to renew our nation's promise and revitalize our nation's civic health.



PS -- One week until my internship begins!

From civic engagement to civic health

I just finished reading Stephen Goldsmith's The Power of Social Innovation: How Civic Entrepreneurs Ignite Community Networks for Good as preparation for my internship (which begins in about ten days!). Goldsmith is a faculty member at the Harvard Kennedy School (HKS) who has served as a mayor in Indianapolis and as the chair of the Corporation for National and Community Service (which is the government agency where the White House Council for Community Solutions is situated). Reading the book this week reminded me a lot of my HKS core coursework, especially on public leadership and management.

The Power of Social Innovation presents a series of case studies of civic leaders of all varieties working with communities to advance systemic change that is community-owned and community-led. Igniting creative civic engagement is particularly significant because the focus is not on creating new organizations and initiatives but on thinking beyond individual organizations and instead on interconnected support networks within fertile communities. This logic is reminiscent of fellow HKS professor Ed Glaeser's The Triumph of the City: How Our Greatest Invention Makes Us Richer, Smarter, ­Greener, Healthier, and Happier, which espouses the following mantra over and over again: invest in people, not places.

Transforming communities' civic health requires an integrated approach with the public, non-profit, and private sectors working together with communities. Reforming education is imperative, and it's no surprise that many of Goldsmith's examples of successful models that work across sectors in interconnected ways have their roots in education -- America's Promise's Grad Nation efforts, YouthBuild, and Neighborhoods@Work.

The mission of HKS is to cultivate civic leaders who will generate ideas to solve the world's most pressing public problems. We -- and many others -- have an obligation to become the public leaders who will work with communities to lead civic realignment efforts that collaborate effectively across sectors towards greater civic health.

The Summer Ahead

The problems facing today's world are too immense to be tackled by solitary thinkers. Only when change agents work together across sectors can we make a significant and long-lasting impact. This summer, I will be working with the White House Council for Community Solutions to do just that.

Established by an executive order by President Obama in December 2010, the Council is a group of high-profile leaders from across different sectors who are charged with the task of moving the needle on catalyzing local cross-sector solutions to connecting young Americans to great educations and a stronger career trajectories.

I am incredibly grateful to the Women and Public Policy Program and the Adrienne Hall Fellowship for supporting my summer internship. The work I'll be doing is the perfect merger of my intersecting interests in urban education policy, civic engagement, and asset-based community development.

I don't leave for D.C. for another two weeks, but I've been so excited that I've been talking to people at the Kennedy School and beyond and reading as much as I can about collective impact, cross-sector community solutions, disconnected youth, and more.

The Council meets as a large group once every quarter (and I'll be fortunate enough to be in D.C. for one of these this summer). Their first gathering was held in February, and you can watch most of the proceedings online. Here's the opening segment from that first session:

Over the next few months, I'll be documenting my internship and reflecting on the work I'm doing. I hope you'll enjoy reading about what I'm doing, and once I gather the links from my fellow WAPPP colleagues, you can read all about their fabulous internships as well.