The Jenzabar Foundation interviewed Stacie Pinzl, from the M3C Fellows at Edgewood College. M3C Fellows at Edgewood was another one of The Jenzabar Foundation’s Student Leadership Award winners from this year.

Check out the below to learn how the program got it’s start, how fund raising initiatives helped it grow, and what Stacie and her members have planned for the upcoming school year.

The Jenzabar Foundation: As an M3C Fellow yourself, could you give us a bit more information about the M3C Fellows Program, including what makes one eligible for it and what being a member of it entails?

Initially, to apply to become an M3C fellow, students had to demonstrate a background in service and interest in continuing and increasing that work in the future. Students also had to demonstrate financial need or be the first in their family to attend college in order to be eligible to participate.

The M3C Fellows Program is a program that is designed to incorporate education with civic engagement among campuses across the Midwest.  In particular,  this program entails participation between service, training meetings and individual mentoring. Each individual student must complete 300 hours with partnerships in the community that meet the requirements of Americorps. When students complete the 300 hours at the end of one academic school year that are logged weekly, an education award is given to each student to use toward tuition, or federally funded student loans.

It is in the opening orientation that each student is provided a variety of community partners in which they chose which one best fits them. This allows students and the Edgewood College to form a solid base to form connections and service with throughout the year. Students are allowed to have other volunteer sites as long as they match the requirements of Americorps.  In addition, to create a more focused and close-knit group, training meetings are set up monthly to check-in and provide organization, time-management, motivation and set-up group projects.  Furthermore, students meet with individual mentors bi-weekly to reflect about their experiences and to keep on track as well as discuss any problems with their community service site.

TJF: This past year you single handedly organized a group of Edgewood College student volunteer to provide after-school support for one of Madison, Wisconsin’s largest homeless shelters. What advice do you have on how to successfully coordinate a campus volunteer program as successfully as you did? Have you considered using social media outlets such as Facebook or Twitter in your organization efforts or to recruit more student volunteers?

Awareness is the biggest key to develop a functioning volunteer program.  When I originally was given the position to organize this group it was on the verge of dying out. After talking with a few friends, I asked them about the program and if they had heard about it. The majority of students said that they hadn’t heard of it, but were interested in maybe going once to try it out. It was then that I knew the issue. There was interest it just wasn’t known campus wide. I immediately started sending out campus wide emails and putting up posters in the most eye catching places. Within a week, I had received emails from about 20 interested students. I kept them on a separate email group which I would then send reminder-emails to them. Also I kept encouraging them to bring friends along.

My only other advice is to keep in touch with the current volunteers through email with reminders of the upcoming dates. Also, a big hit, was an end of the year celebration with pizza to commemorate their hard work. I asked the head volunteer coordinator from the Salvation Army to come in and we had a reflection night. It’s not only the service that we do, but it’s in reflection that what we learn the other components that we never stopped to think about before we were in the active in service. 
            Considering it was my first year running this program, I was overwhelmed by the results of growth. I had not used Facebook or Twitter to recruit more volunteers. This is something  that I might try using in the future. However, I feel the results I am getting right now are satisfactory. There is always room for more growth and I think these media outlets could hold the potential for that.

TJF: Do you plan to continue your work with the after-school recreational program at the Madison shelter or are you looking into new volunteer projects for the upcoming school year?

I think it is really important to maintain the connections with the partnerships you already have. I think in particular with this after-school recreational program, there is a lot more that we as a campus can get involved with. I don’t see the need to search out new volunteer projects.  I will be studying abroad during my spring semester and with my involvement with this program, I am searching for a temporary replacement to take over my leadership. It is in this continuation of my work with the Salvation Army that not only do we deepen our relationship but continue our service for years to come.

TJF: Finally, how do you plan to use the $5,000 Jenzabar Foundation Student Leadership Award?

While we haven’t designated an extremely specific use for the funds yet we said in our application that we would use the funds to promote student service work through the M3C Fellows program and other service-centered campus programs.  Personally, I would like to see this money going towards creating the M3C Fellows into more of a family than just a campus organization. At the end of the last semester at our group meetings, there were students who still didn’t know the other thirteen members. I believe if we had taken an off campus retreat or did something fun we would have engaged  more. We would have had the opportunity to get to know each other better than in the two hour lecture meetings we had.   Additionally, at the end of this past semester we were able to obtain outside money different than the money given to us from Americorps. This money will be given to each M3C fellow after the completion of the 300 hours to increase the original education award. This money will help strengthen our group in awareness and expansion.