Service as an Opportunity to Help Others and to Gain Valuable Experience and Have the Learning Opportunity of a Lifetime

In this episode of The S-Files, we are exploring the service done by AmeriCorps alumna Barb Suozzi, who previously served three terms with Marshfield Clinic Health System (MCHS) Recovery Corps from 2018-2021. Barb discusses her service as a recovery coach at two different sites across her service, detailing how during her first year she helped individuals with substance abuse disorders to make and follow their recovery plans while serving at the Family Health Center of Marshfield Alcohol and Drug Recovery Center in Minocqua. She then described her service the next two years at Arbor Vitae - Woodruff School, where she was primarily working on prevention activities and support for counseling, with her activities and roles adapting due to the COVID-19 pandemic, including shifting to preparing and delivering lunches for students that needed them when school shifted that for several months to virtual in 2020. Barb later discusses how her service experience helped lead to a job at the school assisting students as a mental health liaison before retiring and then using her Segal Education Award to study and complete volunteer service in Italy. Listen to learn about the advice that Barb would share for AmeriCorps members that she gained from her own experience, and how it led her into new career pathways and the learning opportunity of a lifetime.