The VISTA Project

When Angela Serwaa-Marfo began her national service year as an AmeriCorps VISTA at the International Rescue Committee (IRC) in Baltimore, Maryland, she focused her efforts on sustainable capacity building. Her critical mission was to design systems that allowed staff to more efficiently deliver essential services to humanitarian immigrants. In successfully navigating these complex programmatic workflows, her service year transformed her into a confident public health leader.

The Challenge
One of the most persistent operational hurdles facing the IRC staff was connecting incoming clients with vast networks of community support. While comprehensive data existed across the office, precious time was frequently lost searching for fractured, changing updates regarding food banks, utility assistance, and external institutional criteria. The pantry and integration structures required centralized mapping to move from passive spreadsheets into proactive support structures.

The Solution
Angela stepped forward to resolve this bottleneck by developing a monthly internal resource newsletter. Rather than a simple communication blast, she treated the initiative as a meticulous research operation. Acting as a dedicated resource mapper, Angela personally contacted area organizations to confirm eligibility parameters, synthesized complex guidelines into clean, actionable data summaries, and curated the monthly distributions to reflect the immediate, seasonal needs of clients. Simultaneously, she took the helm of the IRC Baltimore’s internship program—bravely mastering administrative hiring processes, intern onboarding, compliance orientations, and professional development programming such as high-impact Lunch and Learn sessions.

The Legacy
Angela’s resource newsletter streamlined service delivery, generating sustainable, long-term efficiency models for the IRC community engagement team. Her foundational mapping framework survives as a permanent infrastructure asset for staff. Furthermore, her management of the internship program directly future-proofed the host site's volunteer pipeline, guaranteeing that the IRC retains the institutional capacity to engage with and support the Baltimore immigrant community for years to come.

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Life After VISTA

Angela successfully leveraged the system-building, data tracking, and administrative hiring skills gained during her VISTA year to transition into a career in specialized health systems. A proud graduate of Johns Hopkins University with a B.A. in Public Health Studies, she currently serves as a Clinical Research Recruitment Specialist at the University of Colorado Anschutz. Today, she operates as a collaborative public health professional, directly applying the community-facing asset mapping and project management skills mastered during her service year to help communities thrive.