Speedier Selection For Graduates, Seniors
A streamlined process for accepting college seniors for VISTA service is now in operation.
Under the new method, students with a college degree and those who will receive degrees during this academic year are eligible for immediate selection, barring unusual medical or legal problems.
The speeded process has been put into effect in response to requests from students who wish to plan now what they intend to do when they leave the campus.
VISTA staff evaluators, accompanying recruiters on campus visits, will review new applications and will issue, while there, invitations to qualified seniors and graduates to enroll in VISTA training programs.
There are training programs open for almost immediate
entry, but students may, of course, defer training until their academic year is completed.
Students who request selection under the accelerated process will be able to indicate their preference for a training program designed for the specific type of VISTA assignment they wish to undertake: urban slum, rural community development, migrant camps, Indian reservations, mental health, or Job Corps camps. VISTA will honor these preferences as far as it is practicable, in order of the three areas of preference applicants will be asked to list. Commenting on the new selection method, Thomas Powers, VISTA's Director of Recruitment, reported that "college students have been requesting this move for some time and we're glad to be able to respond.
"They have been asking both VISTA and the Peace Corps to devise some system that would give seniors and graduate students a chance to make plans that they can count on, rather than being forced to come to some last-minute decision." Powers said. "VISTA recognizes this need and is adjusting to it.
"Everyone stands to gain—both the student and VISTA. The student gains time to make a meaningful decision. VISTA, we believe, stands to recruit more Volunteers who have a surer idea of where they are going and why."
If you have your bachelor's degree or if you will receive it this academic year, and if VISTA recruiters are not on campus now, write for your VISTA application to:
Graduate Program, c/o Thomas Powers,
VISTA, Washington, D. C. 20506
the VISTA VOICE
A publication of Volunteers In Service To America
For Some VISTAs, A Different Future
The college student or graduate with a future career all charted may be taking a chance by becoming a VISTA Volunteer. VISTA can shake you up a little
But it can also help you to reset your sights once your assignment is completed.
You may find that working in poverty on a tight VISTA allowance has its own rewards, and ask for more. Thirty-three percent of all VISTAS do—by re-enrolling for another complete year or extending their service for a briefer period.
In its efforts to make your search for a new challenge meaningful, VISTA's Volunteer Information Service begins with the knowledge that the successful VISTA Volunteer is sought after. Schools and colleges find that the ex-VISTA is a more mature student. Social action agencies and welfare service organizations know that a lot of training time can be saved by the employment of former Volunteers.
Here is a sampling of our risktakers, and what has become of them:
JANE HILLYER, who graduated from the University of California at Berkeley and was one of the first VISTA Volunteers, started a tutorial program in a Pittsburgh slum with local college students. The city was impressed enough to hire her as a full-time director of "Medicare Alert" when she finished her VISTA service. She organized more than 80 canvassers to bring the Medicare story to the senior citizens of the ghetto.
HERB ALVAREZ, who attended the Borough of Manhattan Community College, was a claims adjuster, making a good salary, when he decided to join VISTA. As a Volunteer, he worked with a New York City gang called the "Assassins", Puerto Rican youths whom even the most devoted social workers had written off as lost. Under (Continued on page 3)
There are over 100 VISTA Volunteers serving in Alaska—the 49th state. Most live and work in remote villages, accessible only by bush plane or dogsled. For the story of one Volunteer's experience in the village of New Stuyahok, see page 4.
THE TOP TWENTY
The following schools lead the nation in per capita contribution of Volunteers In Service To America:
1. UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA at Berkeley
2. UNIVERSITY OF OREGON
3. UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA
4. SAN JOSE STATE COLLEGE
5. UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN
6. WAYNE STATE UNIVERSITY
7. UNIVERSITY OF UTAH
8. LOS ANGELES CITY COLLEGE
9. SAN FRANCISCO STATE COLLEGE
10. CORNELL UNIVERSITY
11. UNIVERSITY OF COLORADO
12. UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA (tied)
13. UNIVERSITY OF DENVER (tied)
14. PORTLAND STATE COLLEGE (tied)
15. SYRACUSE UNIVERSITY (tied)
16. TUSKEGEE INSTITUTE (tied)
17. UNIVERSITY OF OHIO
18. BAKERSFIELD JUNIOR COLLEGE
19. SANTA MONICA CITY COLLEGE (tied)
20. UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND (tied)
VISTA To Recruit On 800 College Campuses
VISTA launches this year the most extensive recruitment campaign it has yet undertaken—and the main thrust of this drive is focused directly at the nation's colleges and universities.
VISTA recruiters will have visited more than 800 educational institutions throughout the country by the end of this academic year.
College students continue to respond increasingly to VISTA's challenge and a national effort to wipe out poverty. A great majority of the present contingent of VISTA Volunteers were in college or recently graduated when they decided to join VISTA. In all, 76 percent of all Volunteers have attended college.
These Volunteers joined VISTA fully aware that they would get the hard work, long and irregular
hours, low pay and the frustration that have—and continue to be—promised to them. But there apears to be general agreement among the Volunteers that the main attraction VISTA offers is: Challenge, tremendous responsibility and an opportunity to make a real and practical contribution.
Despite the disappointments and setbacks that VISTA Volunteers learn to expect, 90 percent of VISTA's alumni say they would go through it again if the same opportunity and circumstances presented themselves.
But there is more concrete evidence of this commitment. On a monthly average, 23 percent of those Volunteers completing a year of VISTA service re-enroll for another full year, and an additional 11 percent extend their service for several more months
—bringing re-enrollments or service extensions to just over a third of all Volunteers who have completed their first year of service to date.
Now, once again, VISTA is seeking out more young men and women who are able and willing to stay in the kitchen when the heat is on. On the basis of recent history, the search will be successful.
Item: The number of VISTA Volunteers in service and in training has doubled in the last year.
Item: More than 160,000 citizens have written to Washington expressing interest in VISTA nearly three times more than last year at this time.
But the demand for Volunteers continues to grow. There are on
(Continued on page 3)