Emma Clark
Campus Compact AmeriCorps member serving at
Knox College's Kleine Center for Community Service, Galesburg, IL
Galesburg and the Kleine Center
The Mark and Jeannette Kleine Center for Community Service
manages engagement opportunities for Knox College, which is
located in Galesburg, IL. Galesburg is in western Illinois and has
a population of 33,000. It has depopulated approximately 45%
in the last forty years. Knox College operates on a trimester
schedule, with three terms per academic year.
COVID Capacity Building
In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Kleine Center shut
down most operations in March, 2020 and did not reopen until
August, 2020. Consequently, the AmeriCorps member worked
with the Kleine Center to revise previous processes so that they
aligned with COVID limitations. COVID capacity building
included:
Reestablishing communication with community partners
Translating campus safety guidance for engagement opportunities
Transferring paper processes online
Creating remote engagement opportunities
COVID Challenges
During the fall 2020 trimester, students contributed about 80%
of the hours that they had during the fall 2019 trimester.
However, a combination of circumstances made engagement
coordination for the winter trimester more challenging:
COVID surge
Uncertain campus return date for students
Fall volunteer surveys indicated a lack of connection amongst students
COVID Results and Solutions
As a result of these challenges, the Kleine Center refocused its
efforts for the winter trimester on opportunities that took more
time but were more likely to connect students. Students who
participated in these opportunities were more likely to report
that their self-awareness increased, that they learned
something, or that they connected with someone.
Regional Office of Education
Regional Office of Education #33 provides education services to
Henderson, Knox, Mercer, and Warren Counties. These services
include Adult Education and Alternative Education Services.
Adult Volunteer Literacy Program
The Adult Volunteer Literacy Program is
funded through an Illinois State Library
Grant. It connects English Language
Learners and adults seeking High School
Equivalency with local community
members for one-on-one tutoring
sessions. Tutors must complete
approximately fourteen hours of training
in preparation for weekly tutoring
sessions.
Partnership Background
The Regional Office of Education and the Kleine Center have partnered
together on this program for approximately four years. During the first
three years of this partnership, 28 Knox students signed up to become
tutors. However, only 4 students became tutors and none of these
students tutored for multiple trimesters. These 4 students tutored for a
total of 33.5 hours over the course of three years.
One of the goals of this year was to explore why volunteers dropped
out of the program and to see if we could be more successful in
retaining volunteers.
Anti-Poverty Focus Impact
The primary anti-poverty focus for this partnership was obtaining
income information. The Kleine Center has not previously collected
information about the impact of its work. To develop a framework for
gathering this data, we had extensive discussions with the Regional
Office of Education about what data is already gathered by their Office.
This led to the Office starting to reexamine the questions it uses to
collect information related to income, which currently focus on the
receipt of public benefits.
Adult Volunteer Literacy Capacity Building
The Regional Office of Education and the Kleine Center identified two
areas of focus for improving tutor retention. First, the partners agreed
that they needed to spend more time coordinating their partnership,
which would result in more sustainable outcomes. Some activities
related to coordination included:
Scheduling bi-weekly meetings
Creating a shared calendar reflecting both academic calendars
Establishing a shared Google Drive to house all partnership work product
Capacity Building (cont'd)
Additionally, a review of notes and data from previous years
suggested that many potential tutors dropped out of the program
while waiting to be matched. Consequently, the partners created
a series of actions meant to keep tutors engaged:
Setting expectations with new volunteers that it would likely take a few
weeks to be matched.
Creating weekly check-ins where new volunteers could stay connected with
the program and learn from other tutors even if they had not yet been
matched.
As a result of these activities, we saw a large increase in the
number of students who became tutors. We also saw tutors
participating for multiple terms for the first time.
For the 2020-2021 academic year, this chart shows results through the end of the winter trimester and does not include data for the spring
trimester
Sustainability
The Kleine Center will rely primarily on student leadership in
transitioning these projects away from AmeriCorps resources. In
addition to a work-study student who has been trained to take
over aspects of these projects, the AmeriCorps member also
collaborated with a KnoxCorps student--a student leader who
spent the current academic year working with the Regional Office
of Education. The KnoxCorps student will be returning to this
position for the 2021-2022 academic year and will work to
continue many of the initiatives started during the current year.
Lessons Learned
Data is a very important tool for checking our assumptions, especially in a
time of crisis. Data often demonstrated that we were more successful than we
anticipated.
Students who have participated in a program are often its best advocates.
Asking for "help" from a party outside of the partnership, such as from a
faculty member or campus office, was rarely successful. Parties need to have
prior knowledge of the partnership or be brought into the collaboration
before we ask for support.