City of Billings - Community Development Division

Billings Metro VISTA Project - Leader: Assist the City of Billings Community Development Division and over 30 VISTA members in impacting poverty and developing your skills as a VISTA Leader in Big Sky country! Leaders must have completed one year of national service, preferably an AmeriCorps VISTA term. They receive a higher living allowance and are provided with an additional $300 per month housing allowance.

Housing, Employment, & Financial Literacy

Dress for Success - Expanding Employment for Low Income Women: If you have a passion for social justice and women’s issues, this position is for you! Help this amazing organization diversify available funding to increase access to job training and employment for economically disadvantaged women. The project will expand service delivery to neighboring American Indian Reservations and includes volunteer development, marketing, and fund development.

Housing Authority of Billings - Media Marketing: Stable and affordable housing is a major determinate of economic opportunity. When families pay approximately 30% of total household income for housing, they are more able to pay for other essentials such as food, education, transportation, and healthcare. Creating a video and media marketing campaign ensures that the programs are reaching potential residents of public housing so they can reside in safe, affordable housing and break the cycle of poverty. This project will help alleviate poverty through the provision of safe, affordable housing to benefit economically disadvantaged individuals and families.

Billings Community Foundation - Access to Education through Community Impact: The goal of this project is to increase academic engagement and retention rates for first generation students through mentoring and community impact participation with Billings Community Foundation. The VISTA member will create a database of community partners, write a marketing plan, update a website, and support the Foundation’s education initiative.

Red Lodge Area Community Foundation - Workforce Housing in Red Lodge, Montana: Connecting people and building community by catalyzing change and sharing resources to build a strong, vibrant, resilient, inclusive community. As a small resort community, affordable housing is a big issue for the local workforce, many of which live in poverty and low-income situations (nearly 30% of households and families in Red Lodge make less than $25k a year.

Montana Department of Commerce, Helena, MT - Impacting Poverty via Economic Opportunity and Fair Housing Choice: There is significant evidence of minority segregation and correlating poverty across Montana. In Billings, Great Falls, Missoula and Helena, concentrations of minorities are only present in poverty-stricken neighborhoods. The overall goal of this project is to develop and implement a statewide plan to overcome barriers to housing choice and promote inclusivity. This will reduce concentrated poverty while improving access to: quality education; affordable housing; employment opportunities; and healthcare.

Child Education & Mentoring

Head Start - Explorer’s Academy - Enhancing Education and Parent Engagement: The overall goal of the project is to increase early childhood education by improving outreach to low income areas and increasing parental engagement in children’s learning at Explorers Academy. This project will alleviate poverty by improving parental engagement in their children’s learning, helping provide the foundation and educational skills children need to rise from poverty and achieve lifelong success.

CASA of Yellowstone County - Mentor Cultural Competency for Students: Every child has the right to a safe, permanent home. CASA of Yellowstone County facilitates volunteer mentor efforts to support abused and neglected children who have been placed in court system to obtain basic services, including protection from bodily harm and neglect, health / mental health services, education, and food security. Native American children are disproportionately represented in child protection cases (approximately 33 percent) while the overall Native American population in Billings is approximately four percent. Increasing the number of Native American mentors will provide children with cultural stability and the potential to maintain relationships with extended families and Tribal connectivity.

Wise Wonders Children’s Museum - Building STEAM - Expanding Education Opportunities: Wise Wonders is an emerging children’s museum and nonprofit organization with creative development exhibits and stations that allow self-directed learning for building creativity, divergent thinking, problem solving and encouraging innovation. The overall goal of the project is to increase academic engagement among low income students by providing STEAM After School Programming such as SciGirls, Project Wild, and Spark.