Idaho HealthCorps AmeriCorps

AmeriCorps is similar to a local Peace Corps where each program focuses on different situations including education, economic opportunity, disaster response, and more. The Idaho HealthCorps (IHC) AmeriCorps program focuses on access to healthcare for children and families. The IHC AmeriCorps program was established at the Institute of Rural Health at Idaho State University in 2009 with the goal to help improve health care access throughout Idaho by educating community members in rural areas about health-related topics. Members also provide health screenings, access to food, and connect community members to local services and resources.

This program has provided hundreds of health profession students and other community members throughout the state with professional development opportunities, hands on learning and education awards (similar to a scholarship).

What can a member do for your organization?

Members will be able to work directly with Idahoans to make change, do outreach, case management, training, teaching tutoring, mediating, cleaning, counseling, catching up on paperwork, etc. Clinical hours, class time, and training time also count towards contracted time. Health Navigators are placed with non-profits across Idaho where they assist the non-profit through direct service including but not limited to recruiting and managing volunteers, working directly with community members to help make a change, or doing work involved in making a direct change.

Who Qualifies and What Does it Take?

To host an AmeriCorps member with Idaho HealthCorps, an organization needs to be a non-profit with a focus in children and family’s health. This can include a wide variety of focuses including food insecurity, homelessness, basic health, schools, and education. Preference is given to Idaho Head Start programs. A host site needs to be able to meet cash and in-kind match requirements which vary year to year. For information on cash and in-kind match requirements, please contact Idaho HealthCorps staff. Host sites also need to be able to provide a site supervisor that can arrange on-site orientation, provide day-to-day supervision of the member, and sign member timesheets. For a full list of requirements of a site supervisor, please refer to the Site Supervisor Handbook. Lastly, sites need to be able to collect personal information including first names and first initials of the last names of the community members their AmeriCorps member serves or unique identifiers for each of the community members served by the AmeriCorps member for data collection purposes.

Host Sites

Southwest Idaho

Genesis Community Health

St. Vincent de Paul

Rolling Tomato

Meridian Fire Department

Envision

Southeastern Idaho

Pocatello Free Clinic

Pocatello Community Charter School

Institute of Rural Health

Eastern Idaho

Michael Mendive, Pocatello Community Charter School

“At Pocatello Community Charter School (PCCS), our AmeriCorps members play an essential role in supporting the diverse needs of our students and enhancing the overall learning environment.”

Joshua Campbell, Genesis Community Health

“At Genesis Community Health, our AmeriCorps members are vital regarding our ability to provide free healthcare and health education to patients without insurance and at or below 200% of the federal poverty line.”

How do we get started?

Organizations looking to host an Idaho HealthCorps member should start by completing the Host Site Application. This is easier to complete if the organization has reviewed the types of members that are available and has checked their budget to see which member type would fit their needs and budget. At that time, the host site may start recruiting members to fill their slots. Members may not begin service until or after September 1.

Host site application