Alumni Stories
Where are they now? Vincent Welder
Sixteen acres of rain gardens maintained, 784 miles of trails built and improved, 211,489 plants, trees and shrubs planted. These are just some of the… Read More
Where are they now? Rachel Sicheneder
The Corps was a great two years for Rachel Sicheneder who spent 2012 in Windom as a crew member and 2013 in Marshall as a… Read More
Where Are They Now? Mary Hammes
Mary Hammes’ path to her current job with the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency traversed three Corps programs: she served on a seasonal Superior National Forest… Read More
Where are they now? Amy Levander
Amy Levander, a 1990 Summer Youth Corps alumna, recently added Corps Volunteer to her title as she helped out at the 2014 St. Croix Boom Site Cleanup event led by current SYC participants. Levander was eager to volunteer with the Corps 24 years after her service because she strongly believes the Corps is an important program. “The Corps does great work not only by helping clean up our natural areas, but also by helping young people discover who they want to be,” she said. Levander attributes her experience in the SYC to helping her grow up -- learning a lot about herself and figuring out the kind of person she wanted to be. Read More
Where are they now? Sean Wickhem
During his four years of service in the Corps, Sean Wickhem did everything from documenting scenic easement parcels by canoe to leading youth in community service, training people how to camp to installing solar panels. Read more. Read More
Where there is a way…there are obstacles
During my three months as a solar heat outreach specialist, I have worked to make connections with community resources while figuring out exactly how my job works. Lately, I feel a lot more like I know what I am doing. I performed my solar furnace presentation for a crowd at an event called Solar Day, which I had devoted much of my work time to since starting. Despite my newness, everything went well. I managed to start a couple of relationships with groups interested in using solar furnaces for themselves and had fun sharing with various others. I even got to be on the local news! It was satisfying to see the payoff of jumping right in. That day is definitely a highlight of my service so far. Read More