My AmeriCorps NCCC Experience

It was weird to go back into the real world. I didn’t have a strict food budget where I must ask my TL if you have enough money to get this food item. I woke up with just me in my room and not with other girls. Even though I complained about the lack of freedoms, I felt some sadness and missed it honestly.

After graduation, I received my offers like they said, and I was chosen by everyone that I interviewed with. Including the cadre, I’ve been hoping for the whole time I was in the program.  I believe everyone that interviewed received at least one offer. I kind of expected that. After they’ve seen the things that FEMA Corps can do and what we’ve been through. Of course, they would want us.

After more workshops, sitting around, we had a graduation practice for 45 mins and then the next day it was time for our Graduation. Before the ceremony our TLs handed us certificates, pins, and medals that we earned. We had the option to wear them or put them in our packed belongings. The ceremony itself was no more than 2 hours. People gave speeches on life, AmeriCorps, the ending of the Atlantic Region, FEMA, etc. During one of the speeches, all of the Corps members were surprised with a gift. The TLs pulled out Challenge Coins for us! Everyone got one for all the hard work we put into as we responded to Hurricanes Harvey, Irma, and Maria. That is probably one of my favorite things I received from the Corps since the coin was custom made for us, the last Eagle Unit and last class of the region.

 Atlantic Region has a tradition that each makes a quilt that summarizes their service year. And on the quilt each team is given a square cloth to personalize. I was tasked to be the POC for my team since no one knows how to sew or even stitch. By the time the campus gave me the square I was over everything and I just sew our team number on it. But the finished product of all the quilt squares together was very nice. At graduation, our quilt was handed over to a lady from AmeriCorps headquarters to be placed inside the office in Washington DC. At the moment, I thought I should have put more effort maybe…but nah.

Our campus cut our last round 3?4? days earlier so that we could get our vans from Mississippi and drive back to campus. We stayed in Virginia for a night and as we were unpacking our van it starts to snow. Not even 24 hours off the island and I miss it. When we get to campus, we finally got to see our green bags again. I had so much stuff that I didn’t use and probably would not have used. Since I was in summer my whole year, none of my winter clothes got used except during this week since it was freezing. 

One of the main reasons we believe campus brought us back early was so that we could clean the campus. Since it was shutting down, we had to clean, throw a lot of crap away, pack traditional uniforms so they could be sent to other campus, tear/cut up FEMA Corps uniforms since they were going to be changed, and whatever the heck else they could think of. They made sure to get all the free young adult labor as they could. 

We had a lot of free time after that and we would just sit around and be bored since we couldn’t leave and change out of our uniforms. We did learn about our educational awards and we also did some irrelevant workshops. 

In our last round, my team finally did our FQS. We worked with Hazard Mitigation doing site inspections of buildings. We were supposed to be working in San Juan but we ended u back in Ponce since that was were the need was. There was a little conflict inside our team on that because some wanted to stay in San Juan, some wanted to go back to Ponce. But once we were back in Ponce everyone was fine, because they remembered they loved it and that where the friends they made with the locals were.

Anyway, learning our new job was really confusing at first because we have to estimate the percentage of damage on the roof, foundations, exterior, plumbing, electrical, etc. Especially since none of us have a background in construction or engineering. Luckily we were each paired with local hires who do. So my team didn’t have much interaction with each other at work this round since we were all separated into different cars.

We were mostly on our computers working from our cars so it did get boring since we were so used to walking around during the day. But since we got to travel all across the southern side of the island, it was much better than being stuck at the JFO.  

In the last days of round, we helped train a brand new FEMA Corps team who was just starting their first round. They were going to replace us since we were about to graduate. It was really weird for my team seeing them at first. Their uniforms were still so bright and they were so excited to learn and for their year to start. It made me wonder if that’s how all of us in FEMA Corps or just AmeriCorps in general look at first.

It was done at one of the UPR campuses. It wasn’t that useful considering a lot of broken promises were already made to us. Like we haven’t seen our green bags since we left for our first round. We had a “forum” and there was a lot of complaints about team leaders and staff. Since the campus is getting shut down, a lot of the Corps felt like the staff kind of gave up on them. Especially since staff is in the process of looking for new jobs. Our Region Director even straight up and asked why there were so many people leaving. When there has been a lot of reasons for many people. 

The only good things that came out of transition were the resume building workshops and the fact that we found out that we were going to have Fast Track Hiring into FEMA during closeout. 

With the fast track hiring, we were told we would have the opportunity to interview with different cadre representatives to become Reservists. About a week or two after graduation, we will receive a letter that will have offers from the cadres that had interest in us. The letter will also include the pay rates and we then make our final decision on what offer we want. This was the greatest news I received during my whole term and the whole campus was excited for it. But we didn’t want to get out hopes up until it actually happened. Which is the #1 Rule of FEMA Corps. 

To say this is long over due is an understatement. My personal computer got water damaged while was still on the barge so I couldn’t use it. I had been posting from my cellphone and I just didn’t post one day/week and never got back to it. And here I am almost 7 months after graduation. 

Nov. 5th marks one year since my arrival in Puerto Rico and these past few days I’ve been having so many flashbacks and memories going through my head. And while coming on this blog, I realized that in about 2 weeks it will be the 2nd year anniversary of this blog! So I guess this is a sign that there’s no better time to close out on everything.

We had field training for the things we learned yesterday. We went to houses and a building and practiced using the software. We still are confused on it. We are going to have to see more people do it while in the field to properly learn it.

We're in San Juan!

Cavassing.

I was about to do a registration  on my laptop and I couldn't log into my computer because it didn't recognize my piv.

We found out about transition and next round today.

Transition will be in San Juan and the 3 teams that are still in the States are flying to Puerto Rico for it.  Transition will be for a week.

For next round we will be doing Floodplain Management! So no more DSA!  We'll be working with Hazard Mitigation. Doing site visits and remapping Puerto Rico's flood maps. And other things.  We'll be working out of the JFO in San Juan. We have training in San Juan in two days for our new SPR. We'll be learning how to use a new software to do damage assessments in the field. 

My team is the first to find out our SPR because of the training we have to attend. Our program liasons heard our complaints and they have gifted us. But we can't tell anyone until we get to San Juan.

I'm home for a much needed break.

Day off.

My TL took me and two other members to San Juan to stay the night because we have early flights the next days.

Last days of work before break! Can’t wait to go home for a while.

My team got in trouble today.

My crew lead got us out of work early today to go to an event.  My team kept complaining on why we were there if we weren’t working.  My team called my TL who was taking a sick day asking to leave going around my crew lead.  They left leaving one of my teammates behind alone.