We're hiring!

Great news!  The Grant Street Neighborhood Center has one AmeriCorps position open for the 2013-2014 year and we are hiring right now.

What will you be doing?

• Work with youth every single day!
• Run our afterschool community center and building strong relationships with our youth
• Design and hold programs that are critically engaging
• Connect with our local schools
• Be part of a team that works and grows together
• Be part of PUSH, an awesome community-driven organization
• Be part of The Service Collaborative, and spend a year of service on the West Side
• HAVE FUN!

 This is an AmeriCorps position (part of the ABLE Program) through The Service Collaborative of WNY.  AmeriCorps members receive a living allowance of $12,100 (paid biweekly) and an education award of $5,500 upon completion.  Read more about the ABLE Program here at TSC's site.  The position will begin on September 1st, and the position requires a commitment of a full-year term that will end in August 2014.

If you're interested, please submit a resume and cover letter to gsnc@pushbuffalo.org by July 31st.  We will hold interviews at the beginning of August.

VIEW THE FULL JOB POSTING HERE!

LEARN MORE ABOUT AMERICORPS ABLE PROGRAM HERE! (opens pdf)

May Updates

I'm here with some updates!

1. Scavenger Hunt is postponed, again.   Things got a little out of hand towards the end of last week, so we did not hold the Scavenger Hunt on Friday.  Bethany will be figuring out when it will be held, hopefully in June with a smaller number of groups.

2. PUSH To Next Year is off to a great start!  We have held homework and study groups for the last two weeks and we've already started to help a lot of people.  PUSH To Next Year will be every Thursday in May at 6pm, so bring your school work in!

3. Summer programming is right around the corner!  Come in and help us come up with ideas for what to do.

4. Upcoming closings:

• Closed Friday May 24th and Monday May 27th for Memorial Day weekend
• Closed Friday June 7th
• Closed Friday June 14th for AmeriCorps training
• Last day of school year hours on Wednesday, June 26th!

Scavenger Hunt on May 17th!

More stuff in May!  We had to reschedule our Scavenger Hunt due to bad weather, but rain or shine (and hopefully shine), we are holding it for real next week Friday, May 17th.

Bethany has put together some fun clues for different things you can find in the neighborhood.  Here's how it's going to work:

1. Make a team of four.  At least one of you needs to have a camera (phone is fine) for the clues.  If you don't have a camera or are under the age of 13, we will have some PUSH people to help you out.

2. Create a team name and take a photo.

3. On May 17th, you can start as early as 3pm.  All clues are due back to the Center by 6pm.

4. The team that has found the most clues will win a pizza party (at La Nova's).

PUSH To Next Year!

Hi all!  The Center is running an end-of-year school prep program throughout May and June. We will close our Open Hours and welcome any student who wants some extra time to prepare and study for exams. The days in May are every Thursday at 6pm; for June, it will be every day at 6pm for the first week, then every day at 5pm until the end of the school year. See the flyer above and ask if you have questions!

(We may add extra days in May if a lot of people are wanting to have study hours.)

We are planning to:
- Have 1-on-1 homework help for any assignments you have to catch up on
- Help facilitate study groups if you like to study with friends
- Do some focused review for Regents Exams (currently looking at Global, US History & Government, Algebra I, and Geometry I)
- Create a fun but focused environment to study, if you like to study alone

If anyone is looking to volunteer, please contact Janice at gsnc@pushbuffalo.org.

Spring time is here!

We had a great clean-up on Earth Day with our youth and others who came out from Buffalo State College, Sean Ryan's office, and David Rivera's office.  We really appreciate the support from our local representatives!

We also have a lot going on with our programs coming up.  We took a week off after finishing up our 4-week series with University of Buffalo, but we have programs again today, starting at 5pm.  Here's a highlight of some of the work the Writing Club has been doing:

This was from a few weeks ago, when they focused on identity.  This one was my favorite because of the "we are" statement :)

Here are a couple pictures from yesterday:

 

Issa hanging out with Johnnie in their PUSH swag

 

Madey and Musa showing off their jump rope skills, while

Amanda and Jamie keep the rope turning

Grant Street Clean-Up with PUSH and WEDI!

In celebration of Earth Day, PUSH is partnering with WEDI (Westside Economic Development Initiative) to hold a clean-up next Monday, April 22nd.  We will start at the West Side Bazaar at 25 Grant Street and work our way up to the Center at 271 Grant Street, cleaning from Ferry up to Delavan.

Meet at the West Side Bazaar at 3pm and join us for drinks and snacks at the Center starting around 6pm.  We will also have a couple prizes for our volunteers (two PUSH tshirts!).  Help keep our community clean!

Catching up with April events!

There is so much going on!  Make sure to keep stopping by to see what's up :)

As mentioned in our last post, we finished up our workshops with UB last week.  If you haven't seen the video yet, check it out and leave a comment!  We had a great attendance for our final week where we were able to share what each group put together.  We also did a brainstorm activity where we really looked at how peace and violence can cancel each other out.  This was what Girl Talk came up with:

Last week, we also made a banner for The Service Collaborative's project "What Will You Bring to the Table?", which focused on the issue of child hunger both in our community and around the world.  Bethany and Keith brought it to their AmeriCorps training last Friday and got a hundred signatures on the pledge!  AmeriCorps members came up with different ways we can end food insecurity ... see what the wrote below:

Lastly, we held an UNO tournament last Thursday.  Arag took him the top prize, a $10 gift card to McDonald's.  Here are some photos of the final round between Arag, Issa, Boncko, and Musa:

We have a lot more coming up, so stop by or keep reading here!

"Breaking Down Violence" with UB and PUSH

We are nearing the end of our four-week workshop series with University of Buffalo.  We spent the last few weeks with a graduate class in the Graduate School of Education to really focus on different issues associated with violence.  Usually, our three groups don't focus on the same topic so these workshops had us all talking about the same thing: What is violence and how does affect our lives?

Our "Word Swag" Writing Club focused on the issue of bullying and will be presenting what they've learned in the last two weeks and how they feel about bullying.

Guy Talk put together a video on different ways we can deal with conflict resolution.  See the video here!



Lastly, Girl Talk focused on the violence that happens in relationships and between men and women.  They did a small art project focusing on awareness of the issue with empowering messages for women in tough situations.

It's been awhile, so I will try and keep this blog updated to keep everyone in the loop about what we've been doing!

- Janice