Any former peacecorps / americorps members?

i did city year chicago (americorps) in 2000-2001.

if that's a program you're interested in, i'd be happy to talk about pros and cons.

americorps is an umbrella group for 600 or so smaller programs. city year is the oldest and (i think still) the largest. it was in 13 cities when i was a corps member, more now.

if city year's not your thing, that's cool -- i'm not sure i'd choose it again, frankly.

the biggest general lesson i learned is to pay attention to how well-administered the program you're interested in is. i liked the admin bunch in general at CY and wouldn't have thought it mattered much how good they were at their jobs, since they were friendly. but it was incredible how frustrating it became. the work -- like all americorps work, i'd imagine -- was difficult, tiring, and often frustrating. that's okay; it needed doing, and we were willing to work hard. but the administration should have been supporting us, not being an unnecessary burden. they weren't bad people, just less competent on the whole than i would have liked.

that said, the staff at chicago has changed since my time in the corps; it may well be a great place to work now. but whatever program you're looking at, i'd advise you to pay attention to the folks in charge as well as the mission, day to day work, etc.