Additional Content Links for AmeriCorps South Carolina:
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LINK [External Site] - Funding Opportunities (AmeriCorps federal)
- AmeriCorps National (multi-state)
- AmeriCorps VISTA
- AmeriCorps NCCC
- AmeriCorps Seniors
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LINK - Funding Opportunities (AmeriCorps South Carolina)
- AmeriCorps State Notices of Funding Opportunity (state direct service programming)
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LINK - (March 2025) - APPLY TO SERVE AS A COMMISSIONER! South Carolina Commission on National and Community Service
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Commissioner applications must be submitted no later than Monday March 31
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About AmeriCorps
Disaster Services Economic Opportunities Education Environmental Stewardship Healthy Futures Veterans Services
Benefits of Service
The benefits that individuals serving with an AmeriCorps SC program are eligible to receive are listed below.
Living Allowance
Your living allowance will help cover the basic costs of living, which allows national service to be an option for everybody. Furthermore, living within tight economic bounds encourages AmeriCorps Members to relate more closely with the resource-limited communities they serve. (The amount of living allowance varies by program and term type. Please refer to the application process for each AmeriCorps SC program listed below for more details.)
Health Insurance
Health insurance, which meets Affordable Care Act standards, is provided to those serving full-time as AmeriCorps Members. Coverage varies by program, but general questions are addressed on this website.
Education Award
Following your successful completion of your AmeriCorps term of service, you will become eligible to earn the Segal AmeriCorps Education Award. This can be applied to existing student loans or to future education endeavors. Each AmeriCorps Member can earn up to the equivalent of two full-time education awards, totaling over $11,000. Over 180 institutions of higher education will match your AmeriCorps Education Award.
Professional Development / Job Training
Many AmeriCorps Members utilize the valuable job training, professional development, and networking opportunities they participating in while serving in an AmeriCorps SC program to advance their career after their term of service.
Childcare Assistance
Full-time service Members may qualify for childcare assistance. The application process can be completed here.
Loan Forbearance
Your federal student loans qualify for loan forbearance (i.e. payment postponement) during your term of service. Furthermore, the federal government will pay for the interest that your loans accrue while in forbearance during your year of service. You can learn more about applying for loan forbearance here.
Meet Like-Minded Peers
You will get to serve alongside other service-minded peers who seek to strengthen our South Carolina communities. Further, you will join a network of over 1,000,000 AmeriCorps Alum, who can link you to resources and job opportunities following your AmeriCorps service. Register here to start receiving AmeriCorps Alum benefits today.
2023-2024 AmeriCorps SC Programs
Click on each tab below to view our entire portfolio! Each program has a link to apply following the description.
South Carolina First Steps offers up to 38 part-time service opportunities across the state. Two of the service positions, the HIPPY Parent Educator & Family and Community Engagement, complete activities ranging from providing one-on-one support for parents to hosting outreach events about school readiness and local early childhood services.
The Midlands Reading Consortium (MRC) is a direct service program of United Way of the Midlands. MRC addresses low reading proficiency by supplementing and enhancing shared reading experiences to ignite a love of reading and improve reading engagement for elementary school students. AmeriCorps Members coordinate schedules and enroll prekindergarten to third-grade students in one-on-one reading and STEM engagement sessions with district-approved volunteers, engage parents about the importance of reading at home, increase home libraries through book distribution, and promote literacy and STEM through general outreach and community engagement in Richland, Lexington, Orangeburg, Fairfield, and Newberry Counties.
City Year operates in schools across Richland and Lexington County providing critical support to students through academic tutoring, mentorship, and after-school programs. Our AmeriCorps Members serve as Student Success Coaches, working directly with students to enhance their educational experience, build essential skills, and foster a positive school environment.
In 2017, Furman University became South Carolina’s first university partner with the National College Advising Corps (NCAC). The Furman College Advising Corps places well-trained recent college graduates in under-resourced communities to establish a stronger college-going tradition. Emphasis is placed on increasing the rate of college enrollment and completion among low-income, first-generation college and under-represented students. Using the NCAC ‘near-peer’ model, advisers form relationships with students through one-on-one meetings, group presentations, college tours, parent engagement activities related to the college applications process, and financial aid.
The United Way of Kershaw County Ready Readers Program focuses on lifting lives through the love of literacy. AmeriCorps members serve in Kershaw County Elementary Schools as tutors and classroom literacy leaders. Impacting lives through helping students reach their reading goals.
Teach For America South Carolina (TFASC) is working to recruit, develop, and retain high-quality teachers who transform student outcomes in the state’s most under-resourced schools. Our movement has grown from placing our first corps of 31 teachers in the Pee Dee region to supporting more than 800 teachers who positively impacted more than 70,000 students across the state since 2011. In addition to serving as role models, nearly two-thirds of our first- and second-year teachers achieved over a year’s worth of academic growth in their classrooms and closing learning gaps at accelerated rates.
Through United Way of the Piedmont's AmeriCorps Direct Service program, you can serve as a Teacher Support Specialist at a local elementary schools in Spartanburg, South Carolina, providing opportunities for teachers and students to get the support they need to thrive. Our AmeriCorps Members spend one academic year in an elementary school where they serve teachers and students through providing small group instruction, supporting social and emotional needs of students, enriching family and school relationships, assisting teachers with remote and e-learning opportunities, and supporting students with one-on-one reading and math assistance.
The CISofSC AmeriCorps program will place AmeriCorps Members in elementary, middle school and high school campuses across South Carolina to meet students where they are at and provide wraparound support for students and their families to thrive. Our Student Support Coach position is designed to build deep relationships with the students and families while working with them to remove barriers that impede educational success. CISofSC AmeriCorps members work with students one-on-one and in small groups as an integrated support to campus community, in service of equitable access to education opportunities.
The Palmetto Conservation Corps is South Carolina’s only trail-based state AmeriCorps Program. The Corps completes service work on the Palmetto Trail, through public lands, in communities, and with various organizations throughout the state. The Corps works to improve public lands and communities through conservation projects, community partnerships and outreach, service-learning, and environmental education.
The Environmental Conservation Corps is a service-learning and workforce development program based in North Charleston, SC that engages AmeriCorps members in conservation service experiences that promote climate resilience, quality of life and sustainability in both protected places and urban environments within our Lowcountry region. Our goal is to create the next generation of conservation leaders while performing critically needed conservation projects that promote coastal resilience and protect the places most vulnerable to a changing climate. Members serve in full-time 1700 hour positions and half-time 900 hour positions.
Healthy Learners operates across South Carolina, providing essential health services to school-aged children to improve their overall well-being and academic performance. Our AmeriCorps Members serve directly with schools and communities to ensure children receive necessary medical care and health education. By bridging the gap between healthcare and education, we help create a healthier future for our state's children.
The SCFCA CHW program will increase access to care, increase health knowledge, promote positive change in health behaviors, and improve health outcomes in 1,000 patients annually for the duration of the Public Health AmeriCorps grant. AmeriCorps members serving as CHWs will track and improve two quality improvement measures and/or a behavioral/social measure. The quality improvement measures will align with the National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA) Healthcare Effectiveness Data and Information Set (HEDIS) standards for diabetes and hypertension. AmeriCorps members will receive training from Community Health Worker Institute (University of South Carolina Arnold School of Public Health) and become certified CHWs upon passing the exam.
United Way of Anderson County AmeriCorps Members will be serving to provide group mentoring and outreach/education services crucial to preventing opioid use, early substance use, juvenile crime and delinquent behavior. Members will be able to serve during a weekend camp at Camp Mariposa. AmeriCorps Members will be engaged in providing extra support at community events and activities that aid in meeting basic needs in communities that are experiencing hardships because of a presence of opioids and other issues related to the whole health of a community.
AmeriCorps Upstate members serve as economic mobility coaches in Greenville County, helping clients assess their current situation, set long-term goals, and tackle immediate needs such as food, housing, and employment. They connect families and individuals to vital community resources and programs and offer free tax preparation through the IRS-certified Volunteer Income Tax Assistance (VITA) program.
The AmeriCorps Financial Stability Project at Trident United Way serves the Tri-County area, helping individuals and families achieve financial stability. AmeriCorps members, serving as Family Navigators, provide essential services to support daily needs and long-term goals such as employment, savings, and education. Through this program, members play a crucial role in enhancing the well-being and self-sufficiency of the community.
Impact America is committed to improving lives by engaging, empowering, and supporting access to critical resources needed by individuals, families, and local communities through its health, education, and financial initiatives. In order for our communities and institutions to thrive, we desperately need the talent, vitality, and perspective that this generation can bring. Impact America provides that opportunity through distinct initiatives, in partnership with AmeriCorps, promoting change while cultivating leadership.
Financial readiness and education is the key to breaking the cycle of poverty in our community. United Way is working to support the education of all young adults and adults in our communities.
Our financial readiness and education for everyone program aims to provide financial literacy tutoring to students in sixth through twelfth grade and adults through service sites in Clarendon, Lee, and Sumter Counties.
AmeriCorps members are dynamic, engaging individuals who commit to intensive service in their community by helping others succeed. In the F.R.E.E AmeriCorps Program, members are 17 years and currently attending high school, 18 years or older with a high school diploma or GED and/or some college, or a retiree and are able to serve 10 to 35 hours per week for one year.
Individuals commit to a one-year term of service by becoming a member of the AmeriCorps Program engaging in small group and one-on-one mentoring. The program aims to educate our youth and adults about budgeting, banking, loans, and many other financial education topics.
Planning Grant for Economic Opportunity.
Arras Foundation will be building on a legacy of successful College Advising Corps programming in the Lancaster and Chester counties region by exploring the next chapter of post-secondary planning and advising program services for high school students in rural South Carolina. The end goal is to see that rural students thrive as they transition from secondary ed into adult life, and to see that rural communities benefit from the energy and talent of our next generation in both the workforce and in civic leadership.
Building on efforts established through the student-led Clemson Engineers for Developing Communities (CEDC) organization, which engages students in community-based, experiential learning, we are working to build a CommuniCorps program under the disaster services focus area. This program would prioritize working with students from low-capacity communities to provide them with training through Clemson University, with the end goal of them returning to their communities to implement the tools and skills they’ve gained, in exchange for tuition forgiveness. Collectively, we plan to develop engagement hubs with local community anchor institutions, which would assist communities in becoming more resilient by assessing vulnerabilities and securing resources, especially through federal programs. We will also develop a service corps that can assist with preparing for, responding to, and recovering from disasters statewide with an emphasis on rural communities.
Where is AmeriCorps in South Carolina? Search our interactive map!
In-service Emergency Fund
SC Service Leaders understand that a term of service can be tough, and when unexpected financial challenges arise, it can make it even more difficult for an AmeriCorps Member to complete their service commitment. To help address this barrier, SC Service Leaders is pleased to announce the In-Service Emergency Fund. The intent of the In-Service Emergency Fund is to provide limited financial assistance to individuals currently serving in an AmeriCorps SC program who have experienced an unexpected expense that may impact their ability to successfully complete their term of service. For AmeriCorps SC members seeking emergency fund relief, please click here.
AmeriCorps SC Alum