Leadership and Service Go Hand in Hand at Student Veterans of America National Conference
By John Lira, Veterans and Military Families Program Officer
In early January, Student Veterans of America (SVA), the country’s largest association of student veterans, held their 8th annual national conference (NATCON2016) at the Disney World Resort in Orlando, Florida. This year’s conference brought together more than 1,700 student veterans to exchange best practices, network, and connect with organizations that provide services and support to veterans. In addition to leadership, the theme of service was also ubiquitous.
The SVA plays a vital role in bringing student veterans together and providing a forum to help veterans achieve educational success and encourage leadership throughout their careers and in their community. Since forming in 2008, the SVA now has more than 1,200 SVA chapters on college and university campuses across the country. The SVA embraces the value that national service brings to an organization as they have seven AmeriCorps VISTA members serving in their national headquarters in Washington, D.C. through the American Legion Auxiliary’s Call to Service Corps. The VISTA members at SVA serve as Chapter Liaisons and provide other critical support to assist the SVA in daily operations.
At NATCON2016, one of the breakout sessions was titled Veterans Reintegration through Community Service and was hosted by Mike Liguori from The Mission Continues, a program that engages veterans in service fellowships through their service platoon model across the country. The panel of student veterans who serve included Riley Wright who recently finished her service year as an AmeriCorps VISTA member with the Illinois Campus Compact. Riley believes in “service as a strategy” and credits her AmeriCorps experience as the reason she was hired as the City Impact Specialist at The Mission Continues. I was pleased to see several other National Veterans Corps organizations present at the conference such as Point of Light, Teach for America, and Team Rubicon, all of which offer service opportunities to veterans.
Like last year, I staffed a table at the SVA conference to engage with vets about leveraging their leadership and sense of duty in their communities through volunteering and national service. I learned that many student veterans are active volunteers on campus and in their community, but had never heard of AmeriCorps and national service and were surprised that an average of 1,200 veterans serve as AmeriCorps members a year. I was also pleased to meet several veterans who were proud AmeriCorps members and alumni.
The main reason I wanted to attend the conference was to inform student veterans about the AmeriCorps VISTA’s Summer Associates Program, a great opportunity to serve for 8-12 weeks during summer break. Many attendees saw the program as a way to serve in their communities while receiving a living stipend or education award and earning valuable hand-on skills in the process. Many veterans I talked to were interested in the summer program and signed up to receive more information on how to serve in AmeriCorps.
As a Marine Corps veteran, an SVA Alumni, and the current Veteran and Military Families Program Officer at the Corporation for National and Community Service, I relished the amazing opportunity to talk to student veterans about national service and to converse with staff of support organizations and thought leaders about the services they provide to veterans.
The most special moment for me occurred when I glanced at the main stage and everything featured on it had special significance to me— the SVA logo hung above a Marine Corps color guard as an AmeriCorps VISTA member, Alina Martinez, delivered a beautiful rendition of the National Anthem. At that moment, I knew that I was exactly where I was supposed to be—serving alongside “yesterday’s warriors, today’s students, and tomorrow’s leaders.”
