Great news! Creating Americorps is now available at your favorite local bookstore.
Ask them to order your copy today.
In Celebration of the
30th Anniversary of AmeriCorps
A New Book From
Catherine H. Milton
Forewords By
Michelle Nunn
President and CEO, CARE USA
Thomas Ehrlich
Former Chair, Commission on National and Community Service and President Emeritus, Indiana University
Afterword By
Senator Chris Coons
“Catherine's story of the creation of AmeriCorps brings to life the magic that happens when leaders in Washington put aside their differences and come together in pursuit of the common good. Her deep understanding of what it takes to create a transformative experience for young people that has real impact on communities–and her determination to see it come to life at scale–were essential to the successful launch of AmeriCorps. The country owes Catherine a debt of gratitude.”
-AnnMaura Connolly, President, Voices for National Service
About the Book
Creating AmeriCorps: Bipartisanship in Action is a first-person account of how AmeriCorps, commonly referred to as the domestic Peace Corps, was created through innovation, perseverance, and commitment.
The author, Catherine H. Milton, who headed the team that launched AmeriCorps, tells her personal story of how she learned to make a difference in the tough world of policing, at the Treasury Department, and on Capitol Hill. Seeing how one person could make a difference and with her new understanding of the power of public service, she was inspired to create new ways for young people to serve their communities and country and launched Stanford University’s Haas Center for Public Service and also Youth Service California. In the 1980s, she became one of the dozens of social entrepreneurs working at the grassroots who were building a new national community service movement.
The book brings to life how these social entrepreneurs and Democratic and Republican leaders, including Senator Edward Kennedy and President George H.W. Bush, came together to create the bipartisan Commission on National and Community Service, the federal agency that laid the foundation for new national service programs. With the election of President Bill Clinton, the staffs of the White House and the Commission worked together to design and build AmeriCorps, creating opportunities for thousands of young people from varied backgrounds to work together to tutor children, build houses for the homeless, improve the natural environment, and assist in times of natural disasters, all while earning funding for their education or training.
To date, over 1.2 million people have served as AmeriCorps members, demonstrating how to move our country beyond fear and anger to hope and positive action. If you're passionate about social change, navigating bureaucracy, and empowering youth to serve, this timely and compelling book is a must-read.
What Readers Are Saying
“Part memoir, part blueprint for change, and all civic history, Catherine Milton’s powerful, personable, and insightful story of AmeriCorps’s birth and journey is one only its midwife could have written. This remarkable book is a welcome antidote to our prevailing cynicism and should be essential reading for students, citizens, and leaders alike.”
— Nazir Ahmad, Founder, GivingWorks & Vice Chair, The Morris & Gwendolyn Cafritz Foundation
“Catherine Milton's first-hand account of the creation of AmeriCorps offers a unique window into how big ideas can be translated into action in government. She highlights how entrepreneurial energy combined with the capacity to attract and unleash talented people who want to make a difference is a recipe for doing big things.”
— Jeff Bradach, Partner & Co-founder, The Bridgespan Group
“The story we have in our heads is that it is impossible to innovate and move quickly inside the federal government. Catherine Milton dispels that deeply embedded (but often incorrect) narrative with her story about the launch of AmeriCorps. If you have a connection to AmeriCorps, you will love Catherine's creation story; if you don't know much about AmeriCorps, you will learn a lot here. In either case, you will get a great story of how national service went from an idea to an experiment to a piece of legislation to a full-fledged program in a few short years. Read it — fast. And enjoy.”
— Amazon review
“Catherine Milton offers many examples of how her work inspired Congress, working across the aisle, to build an initiative, AmeriCorps, that engages Americans in volunteering to serve their country. As someone who also worked on this effort in the state of Washington, I appreciated the steps and overwhelming commitment by Catherine and others identified in her book that brought national service to a working reality. As the National Director of AmeriCorps from 2012 - 2016, I saw firsthand the way service helps unite our country. Catherine identified what it took to initiate this effort which continues to ‘get things done’ for America.”
— Bill Basl, former Director of AmeriCorps
About the Author
Catherine H. Milton helped to shape and launch AmeriCorps, the national service program launched in 1994. Today over 1.2 Americans have served as AmeriCorps members. She learned how to make a difference in the tough world of policing, writing or co-authoring six books on criminal justice reform, and pushing through two significant pieces of federal legislation focused on victims’ rights.
In the 1980s she left Washington, DC to found and direct the Haas Center for Public Service at Stanford University and became a national leader in the new grassroots service movement. In the 1990s, as the first head of the Commission on National and Community Service, she worked across the aisle in both the Bush and Clinton administrations to launch the National Community Civilian Corps(NCCC), the first Summer of Service, AmeriCorps, and the Presidio Leadership Center. Catherine went on to become the senior executive for Save the Children’s work in the US and for Friends of the Children.
She now serves as a Commissioner and chair of the AmeriCorps Program Committee for California Volunteers.
Now Available
Also available at your favorite local bookstore. Ask them to order your copy today!
Spread the word
Interested in updates about the book release and upcoming events?
Email Catherine at CreatingAmeriCorps@gmail.com