The American Connection Corps Program

The American Connection Corps (ACC) is a program of Lead For America, a national nonprofit organization focused on building a leadership force of moral, dynamic, and locally-rooted leaders committed to serving the communities they call home in every corner of this country. ACC is Lead For America’s boots-on-the-ground service corps, aimed at activating local leaders in rural and emerging communities to tackle critical, bi-partisan challenges to advance economic prosperity. Through ACC, Lead For America ensures that national service opportunities are indeed available in “every corner of this country.” 

American Connection Corps Members advance economic prosperity in rural and emerging communities nationwide. Placed with a local public institution, members build critical capacity, attract resources, and activate community engagement across the following key areas:

• Economic Opportunity
• Health and Social Capital
• Agriculture and Natural Resources

As such, bridging the digital divide was selected as a core campaign of the American Connection Corps and is an issue that unites all ACC Members as they serve across these fields. Through yearlong training and support, members are equipped with the tools to understand how they can channel these resources locally, while also building capacity across a diverse set of host institutions and issue areas to ensure that the opportunity that broadband access facilitates can be fully realized. 

Responsibilities

American Connection Corps members are placed in rural, semi-rural, and emerging communities in backbone organizations that are in a position to best support an area’s growth and development. 

These include local county and city governments, regional planning commissions that serve predominantly rural areas, and 501c3 nonprofit and community-based organizations. ACC Members serve a wide range of towns and cities that can range from three-digit populations to more than 60,000. In some cases, members serve in organizations or state agencies headquartered in a regional metropolitan area, or state capitol, but that serve a larger region of rural communities.

American Connection Corps Members are placed with a partnering host organization and a dynamic local supervisor/mentor where their personal skill sets and passions can be unleashed to help move the community forward. Members commit to a year of service, focusing on issues important to economic opportunity, agriculture and natural resources, and/or health and social capital -- critical anchors to a thriving community.