HISTORY OF AMACHI

Amachi began in Philadelphia in September 2000 with funding from Pew Charitable Trusts as a partnership between Public/Private Ventures (P/PV) and Big Brothers Big Sisters of Southeastern Pennsylvania. P/PV was responsible for administrative oversight and financial management of the program and for recruiting congregations and children. The organization also collected and analyzed the data used to monitor the matches and gauge the overall progress of Amachi. Big Brothers Big Sisters of Southeastern Pennsylvania screened the volunteers and children, and made the match.

In 2002 P/PV began an Amachi program in New York, and during the fall of 2003, P/PV began expanding the Amachi model nationwide with the help of funding from the Annie E. Casey Foundation and the William Simon Foundation. The first Amachi Training Institute was conducted in December 2003. As of June 30, 2004, the Institute has trained 439 people representing 138 organizations from 76 cities in 28 states.

Amachi is pleased to partner with Prison Fellowship's Angel Tree program, where in selected locations across the country Amachi and Prison Fellowship collaborate to provide mentors for the Angel Tree children. In return, Prison Fellowship offers the mentors from local congregations a workshop on how the Angel Tree program works. There are more than 600,000 children of prisoners in Prison Fellowship's Angel Tree program.

The Corporation for National & Community Service (CNCS) has supported Amachi since July 2002 when it assigned 40 part-time AmeriCorps members to serve as Congregational Volunteer Coordinators for the Amachi Philadelphia program. In November 2003, the Corporation allotted 55 full-time member slots to support the national expansion of Amachi. Currently AmeriCorps*VISTA members are assigned to Amachi programs in 17 cities across the country.

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