"Connect" your local community with the new MIT Public Service Center Community Service Work-Study Program!

Dateline March 1, 2009
MIT Public Service Center – New Community Service Work-Study Program

Dear MIT Alumni Club members, 

MIT students are always looking for new experiences.  As alumni, you could be a wonderful resource for current students—and for your local community—by helping to locate summer job opportunities with:

- nonprofit organizations
- educational programs
- governmental agencies

Community Service Work-Study (CSWS) is a program that makes it possible for students receiving financial aid to perform meaningful service while receiving a paycheck.   It's also great for community organizations, who receive a significant reduction in the cost of the wages thanks to Federal work-study support.

While most CSWS students find positions in Cambridge during term time, it is also possible for students to work anywhere around the country during the summer and IAP.  If you know of an organization in your area that would be interested in advertising a summer internship or job to MIT students, please share this information with them.  There may also be "hardship funding" available for community organizations that are not able to afford their portion of a student’s wages.

The benefits to an organization are numerous.  Here are a few:

- access to problem solvers and creative thinkers
- a highly motivated student to tackle a project no one else has been able to find time for
- the ability to influence a student’s view of the nonprofit world
- a 66% discount in the cost of student labor

The benefits to a current MIT student are remarkable as well:

- work experience 
- understanding of new communities and their issues
- seeing the results of the work he or she contributes to an organization
- opportunities to apply lessons from the classroom
- travel in another part of the country

Please get in touch if you know of any community organizations that could employ a CSWS student!

And if you would be interested in acting as a mentor to one of these students, please ask me for more information about that too.

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Last modified 03/01/09 05:52 PM