I'm Working For the General!

I have a job! After four months of heavy duty job searching, I was offered a position at The City College of New York in its Colin Powell Center for Policy Studies. I will be the Director of Civic Engagement and Service Learning, starting January 2nd. I want to thank everyone who has been so supportive of me in this journey to gainful employment -- those who made connections, gave support, and helped keep my spirits up when the economy turned south and leads dried up. For those who are curious, here are some details...

* No, Colin Powell doesn't actually work at the Center (he was a graduate of the College), but I do plan to become his BFF (or at least meet him in February at an event we're hosting on immigration policy).

* The Colin Powell Center's mission is "to develop a new generation of publicly engaged leaders from populations previously underrepresented in policy circles and to bridge the academic and policymaking spheres through research and programming." It is a research center and also where the university's community partnerships and opportunities for community-based learning are coordinated (that's where I come in).

* This job is a cool combination of various aspects of my past careers in higher education, the non-profit sector, community service, and public policy. I will recruit and train faculty to integrate community-based learning / service-learning into their courses, manage fellowship programs for students doing communtiy work, and coordinate a network of similar offices at five other universities in the city.

* There are about ten people who work at the Center, and the office is literally in a gothic turret on top of the tallest building on campus! See the turret with the flagpost in the photo... that's where I'll be!

* City College is the flagship institution of the City University of New York (CUNY) system. It has 15,000 undergraduate and graduate students, is located in Harlem, and was founded in 1847 to provide opportunities for first generation college students (which it still does). It has been ranked as the most diverse campus in the country.

* I will have about an hour commute from Brooklyn to Harlem, all on the A train. I will get a lot of reading done.

* I hope to meet a lot of amazing students, community members, faculty, and, maybe, members of the Center's Advisory Council. I also get eight Fridays off in the summer - yahoo!

More details once I actually start...