The UMW Center for Community Engagement works with Campus Compact to place an AmeriCorps VISTA on the UMW campus. In partnership with AmeriCorps, the Campus Compact AmeriCorps VISTA Program seeks to activate higher education institutions and their partners to work together to make an impact on poverty in their local community. The Campus Compact AmeriCorps VISTA Program places AmeriCorps members for year-long terms of service at colleges and universities. The AmeriCorps members build capacity for their host sites, working behind-the-scenes to expand and improve programs that impact low-income people on college campuses and in communities—helping to fulfill the public purposes of higher education and lift individuals and communities out of poverty.
The current UMW AmeriCorps VISTA works with the Bragg Hill Community Garden and the Gwen Hale Resource Center, and focuses on reducing food insecurity on the UMW Campus and in the broader Fredericksburg community. The VISTA has an office in the Center for Community Engagement in the Cedric Rucker University Center. Our VISTA for the 2024-2025 term is Tamara Garrett, a recent graduate from UMW with a degree in Conservation Biology. The Center for Community Engagement has hosted an AmeriCorps VISTA since August 2022, and the VISTA has assisted with growing membership and programs at the Bragg Hill Community Garden, building systems to recruit volunteers at the Gwen Hale Resource Center, and building the capacity of both organizations.