Your Impact
How does the Impact program work?
First, in August 2017, you’ll join other current and new Impact staff in a classroom-style training on the issues, our campaigns, our strategies and the tactics you’ll carry out to win concrete results.
Your assignment
Your campaign assignment will depend in part on where you applied to work and on what issue we can make the biggest difference in that state.
For example, factory farms could be releasing millions of pounds of pollutants into your state’s waters. You might follow the lead of a team of Impact organizers who organized dozens of events and got the attention of local and national media to spotlight this threat to our waters.
Or it could be that local officials in your city are open to replacing fossil fuel power with clean, renewable power — which is exactly what happened in Austin, Texas. The city recently agreed to close the Decker Power Plant — the nation’s largest standing source of smog-forming pollution. Our Impact organizer in Austin helped make it happen by hustling to identify and turn out pro-solar supporters right before a critical city-commission vote.
Even when there's not a vote coming up, organizing helps build long-term power to secure victories in the future. By first educating people on an issue and then winning them over to our point of view, we lay the groundwork for political change.
Impact staff commit to live in the location of their choice for two years, first learning organizing and then applying their new skills. As you start organizing, you learn how to be most effective in your particular state and city — getting to know government officials and their strengths as allies or opponents, what potential partnerships you can develop with organizations on the ground, how to work most effectively with the media in your state, and most importantly, how to build the people power we need to win on the issues.
Most Impact staff will work in states where leaders may think they don’t have to pay much attention to global warming or air pollution or unfair elections — but in those states, there’s tremendous hidden potential for social change. You could apply to work with us in Massachusetts, New York or California. But you might make a bigger impact if you apply to work with us in Georgia, Ohio or Colorado — politically strategic states where you might need to reach beyond the usual allies to make an impact.
Decide where you want to apply
Impact currently runs offices in: Portland, ME; Concord, NH; Boston, MA; Hartford, CT; New York, NY; New Brunswick, NJ; Baltimore, MD; Richmond, VA; Atlanta, GA; St. Petersburg, FL; Columbus, OH; Ann Arbor, MI; Chicago, IL; Madison, WI; Minneapolis, MN; Des Moines, IA; St. Louis, MO; Austin, TX; Albuquerque, NM; Phoenix, AZ; Denver, CO; Missoula, MT; Las Vegas, NV; Seattle, WA; Los Angeles, CA; and Sacramento, CA.
How you’ll make an impact
No single day with Impact looks quite like another. Campaign tactics like running a petition drive or persuading a local group to work with you will keep you on your feet and on the go, but you’ll also need to leverage your work online. You may find yourself recruiting new community groups to join a clean water coalition, organizing a news event on 100 percent renewable energy, meeting with an editorial board about the overuse of antibiotics on factory farms, or building an online following for a campaign to stop factory farms from polluting our water.
During the summer, you’ll run a citizen outreach canvass office, and have the power of a paid staff of college students and others ready to help you build support, recruit new members, and raise funds for the campaign.
At the end of your two years, you'll have worked on a range of urgent issues through a variety of campaign strategies and tactics. You’ll have met with and made the case for change directly to decision-makers. You’ll have organized civic leaders and community groups. You’ll have earned media attention for the issues. And you’ll know that you have done something that matters.
Pay & Benefits
The target annual compensation for this position is $26,000 in the first year. Impact offers a competitive benefits package. We also offer an excellent training program and opportunities for advancement.
Interested in internships?
As an intern with Impact, you’ll help us educate and engage more students and citizens on the most critical issues of our time. You’ll help us get our issues into the media, build coalitions, organize events and lobby decision-makers. Ultimately, you’ll help us build the kind of public support it takes to win. Interns work on campaigns like stopping global warming, getting big money out of politics, and protecting our rivers, lakes and streams.
We’re looking for students who care deeply about the environment and our democracy, and are ready to make a difference now.
And if you’re thinking you might want to make a career out of solving big problems like global warming, interning with Impact is one of the best ways to get started. Not only will you get the training and experience you need, but we hire our most talented and committed interns to join Impact as campaign organizers when they graduate.
We’re hiring interns in Washington, D.C., and in 25 states nationwide.
Impact is an equal opportunity employer and will not discriminate against any employee or applicant on the basis of race, color, national or ethnic origin, religion, age, sex, disability, pregnancy, sexual orientation, or veteran status.