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Kids in Tech AmeriCorps VISTA Community Engagement Service Member

Kids in Tech
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Job Title: AmeriCorps VISTA Community Engagement Service Member

Responsibilities:

  • Be a conduit for KIT and the STEM community in Massachusetts to help launch new programs, policies initiatives, and coalitions that will help advance KIT’s mission.
  • Report to Vista Program Supervisors and work closely with Afterschool Tech Club Program Manager.
  • Seeking partners with new sites for after school STEM programs, community stakeholder engagement, and engaging community members throughout the program process and any future expansions.
  • Conducting focus groups with families, students, and educators. The stakeholder engagement process is designed to prepare KIT for advocacy work on behalf of and in alignment with the target community

Skills:

  • Stakeholder engagement
  • Community organizing
  • Team work
  • Writing/editing

Benefits (through AmeriCorps VISTA):

  • Childcare assistance if eligible
  • Living Allowance
  • Relocation Allowance
  • Training
  • Choice of Education Award or End of Service Stipend
  • Health Coverage - For details about AmeriCorps VISTA healthcare benefits, please visit http://www.vistacampus.gov/healthcare.

Why serve:

Kids in Tech, Inc’s (KIT’s) mission is to excite, educate, and empower children to acquire skills and confidence in technology through interactive after school programs. The existing STEM educational framework does few favors for low-income children, who statistically tend to live in urban or suburban settings and be ethnic minorities. Without targeted interventions that promote STEM education for low-income and BIPOC students, their interests and potential will remain untapped. After-school STEM programs have provided evidence that, even in specialized curriculum settings, children who qualify for lunch subsidies scored lower than their counterparts who did not qualify. Elementary and middle school aged children in these programs did see improvements to their outcomes, and under-privileged groups saw the greatest gains. After-school STEM programs have demonstrated a unique learning environment that enables group-centered and hands-on-learning that make demonstrable gains in knowledge acquisition. KIT’s after school programs have been a vital supplemental opportunity for low-income youth in Lowell schools and housing authority for the past 6 years, and expanded to serve students in Boston in 2021. Performance in STEM areas for these groups remains low in Lowell, Boston, and nationally. It is anticipated that COVID-19 will only widen these gaps. Thus, it is critical that after school STEM programs are able to expand to meet the needs of as more students require support and time to provide remedial education. KIT’s VISTA project will seek to prepare KIT to serve more low-income, minority students in Massachusetts by increasing the organization’s fundraising, communications, curricula, fundraising, and monitoring and evaluation (M&E), and expects to benefit 300 youth aged 8 to 14 from schools where at least 50% of students qualify for the National School Lunch Program (NSLP).

Job Type: Full-time