Impact America

Impact America engages recent graduates and college students to address community needs, empowering a generation through collaborative efforts to promote change in the communities we serve.

• About Us
  Many young adults graduate college with a drive to change their world and learn the best ways to support under-resourced communities. Impact America provides an opportunity for recent graduates to engage with their communities in a meaningful way, broadening their perspectives and making a real impact. Individuals who serve as a Corps Member with Impact America spend a year of service after graduation at a nationally recognized organization working to mitigate the effects of poverty, while also gaining professional experience and a broadened perspective.
  
  Want to learn more about our work? Check out our videos #WhyImpact
  
  AL - https://vimeo.com/383602467
  TN - https://vimeo.com/383813582
  SC - https://vimeo.com/383813131
• Our Impact
  FocusFirst provides a cost-effective direct response to the vision problems of children who live in urban and rural communities. Under the supervision of Impact America staff and AmeriCorps Members, undergraduate and graduate students provide free vision screenings to children, ages six months to five years, in pre-schools and daycares using high-tech photo optic scan cameras. All children failing the screenings receive free follow-up care through Sight Savers America. Since 2004, we've screened 534,588 children with 3,995 student volunteers.
  
  SaveFirst, a high-quality tax preparation initiative, trains college graduates to provide free tax preparation services and opportunities for savings to low-income, working families—especially targeting those eligible for the Earned Income Tax Credit. Since 2007, we've prepared taxes for 90,279 families, totaling $154.2M in returns and saving $31.5M in fees. This work would not be possible without our 6,739 student volunteers.
  
  SpeakFirst enriches the academic experience of talented and motivated students from Birmingham-area high schools through participation in an “all-star” debate team. This highly collaborative initiative addresses a wide array of needs created by the deficit of opportunities and resources in their local communities. In 2019, five of our SpeakFirst students earned $947,469 in scholarship funding and won 55% of their tournaments.