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Get to the PointAlumni spotlight

B3! B3! B3! The Legacy continues Marlee Cea was a Class XVI Corps Member on Badger 3 and Class XVII Team Leader Buffalo 3, both years at the Atlantic Region. The members of Buffalo 3 sat down

with Marlee to talk about her time as

a Team Leader, her life after Ameri-

Corps and her former Corps member,

now Team Leader, Tony Wadas.

What was your favorite project?

I guess one of my favorite projects was

as a Corps Member when I worked on

disaster in Florida. It was in response

to the oil spill. It was my favorite

mostly because I learned the most

from it: volunteer coordination, the

politics involved in disasters and how

different counties work together and

handle it. It was just an educational

experience and my team was awesome

and did a lot of hard work and put in a

lot of hard hours. So, it was the most

rewarding as far as what we could ac-

complish. It was also really informa-

tive.

What made you want to be a

Team Leader?

Well, I have always been a responsible

person. Being a Team Leader was just

the next step up. Being a Corps Mem-

ber, I had the opportunity to be a TL

for a couple of rounds. I knew in order

to explore all of my options, I needed

to come back as a Team Leader and see

what that was all about. I was never

really in a leadership position before

AmeriCorps, so it was a whole new

challenge for me and I wanted to see it

through.

What was the biggest adjustment

you had to make when you went

from Corps Member to Team

Leader?

Probably the sense of having your own

team and being responsible for nine

other people. As a Corps Member,

you’re only responsible for yourself

and the influence you have on the

team. As a Team Leader, you are re-

sponsible for every person on the team

and their actions. It’s a huge weight

that doesn’t go away until November.

Do you feel like you learned more

as a Corps Member or as a Team

Leader?

Probably as a Team Leader. For me, it

was a personal challenge, but it was

also a professional challenge. You

work and interface with the sponsor

and B15 and you have to manage your-

self in a lot of different ways and pre-

sent yourself to your team sometimes

in different ways than how you talk to

anybody else. You just learn to adjust

to all kinds of situations and people

and I think it benefits you in the pro-

fessional world.

Had you worked in a professional

setting before AmeriCorps?

I was a crisis counselor after I graduat-

ed from college. I did that for a year

and a half before joining AmeriCorps.

So all the team drama and per-

sonal conflicts were easy for you

to deal with since you had so

much experience?

Haha, no it definitely wasn’t easy.

That’s another thing you learn as a

Corps Member. There are some people

you can handle, but that you totally

would never choose to room with. I

Marlee Cea, center, third from the right, meet up with her old team Buffalo 3, while the team was

working in Massachusetts. B3 Team Leader, second from right , was her Corps member

Marlee worked as a wildland firefighter

and served as a Team Leader during her

round on the Phoenix composite team.

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Get to the Point

got lucky though, coming back [as a

TL], and like I said, as a Corps Member

I got lucky, I got to lead two different

teams, and my teams were awesome.

As a Corps Member, though, my Unit

team was a little rough around the edg-

es. So, it was the best of both worlds. I

got to challenge myself dealing with

people who I normally wouldn’t choose

to be around, and then people I en-

joyed being around and work with

them. It’s hard. I’m a person who gets

along with pretty much everybody, but

it’s hard when you live and you work

and you eat and sleep and shop and

travel together…

How was the transition from

Badger to Buffalo?

Well, our Unit Leader, when there

were Badgers, was very strict. He was

a disciplinarian and he was a huge per-

son who people were just afraid of, but

in a nice way. If you got to know him,

he was a nice and cool guy, but no one

wanted to tick him off, so that was

nice. As a Team Leader, coming in last

year, we didn’t have a Unit Leader un-

til the middle of first round. It was bit

of a struggle as Team Leaders to set

ourselves up as a disciplinary function.

We had to unify more than normal, I

guess, since we didn’t have a unit lead-

er per se. We had people like Jen and

Dave Beach who helped us out, if we

needed direction and important things

like that, but we didn’t have a direct

Unit Leader to ask questions to.

How has your AmeriCorps NCCC

experience helped and affected

you since graduation?

It has definitely affected me. For one

thing, dealing with so many things, I

have the confidence to know that I

can handle certain things. A lot of

the things that I went through were

very stressful, and things that I never

would have thought could happen

did. After going through them and

not breaking down entirely, you real-

ize that you can handle a certain

amount of pressure and handle that

responsibility that you never faced

before, so it gives you a confidence as

a professional to know that you can

deal with things. When you’re in an

interview, you know you can do it, so

you can sell yourself better. It

sounds weird, but it’s true.

When I first started, I didn’t want to go

back to school necessarily. I didn’t

know what I wanted to do, so through

NCCC and working with so many dif-

ferent nonprofits, seeing so many dif-

ferent sides of nonprofits and commu-

nity development, it’s how I decided

what I want to do. So, I’m going back

to school in the fall, actually.

That’s awesome, what are you

going to study?

I’m going to get a Masters in sustaina-

ble development through the World

Learning Institute.

Do you have a favorite memory of

our Team Leader, Tony?

My whole team was full of big char-

acters, and he was always someone

I could count on. One of my favor-

ite things was listening to him play

mandolin in big groups. Our team

was very musical, and he inspired

other people to practice more and

play more.

Marlee, in the traditional Team Leader green T-shirt, lower right, sits with her Buffalo

3 team and other AmeriCorps members and staff of their sponsor.

Marlee, with her Corps member Greg

Venturini on a service learning event at a

fire station near their spike.