Through Joining Forces, Americans continue to step up and respond to the First Lady and Dr. Biden's call to serve our troops and their families as well as they have served us.

Last week, the Department of the Interior joined forces with the First Lady and Dr. Biden to provide free access to more than 2,000 of America's parks to our troops and their families. Then on Monday of this week, Blue Star Families and the National Endowment for the Arts launched "Blue Star Museums" --  laying out the welcome mat for free access at more than 1,600 museums around the country for service members and military families.

Connecting veterans and military spouses with employment opportunities in the private sector has been a priority for the First Lady and Dr. Biden,  and the effort is paying off. In the last year, more than 1,600 companies have hired more than 70,000 veterans and military spouses through Joining Forces.

Just last week, 34 more companies and organizations joined forces with the Military Spouse Employment Partnership (MSEP), a partnership of more than 130 companies committed to hire and retain military spouses. Since June of last year, MSEP companies have hired more than 22,000 military spouses.

And the momentum keeps building. Check out Joining Forces employment efforts in just the last three days:

The SpaceX Dragon spacecraft approaches the International Space Station, May 25, 2012. (Photo courtesy NASA)

Following today's historic berthing of the SpaceX Dragon spacecraft to the U.S. Harmony module of the International Space Station, John P. Holdren, Assistant to the President for Science and Technology, issued the following statement:

For the first time, a private American company has successfully launched a spacecraft into orbit and berthed it with the International Space Station—an achievement of historic scientific and technological significance and a key milepost in President Obama’s vision for America’s continued leadership in space. 

That is exactly what the President had in mind when he laid out a fresh course for NASA to explore new scientific frontiers and take Americans ever deeper into our Solar System while relying on private-sector innovators—working in the competitive free market—to ferry astronauts and cargo to Low Earth Orbit and the International Space Station. It’s essential we maintain such competition and fully support this burgeoning and capable industry to get U.S. astronauts back on American launch vehicles as soon as possible.

I could not be prouder of our scientists and engineers—both government and private sector employees—who have contributed to this historic mission.   A passion for discovery and a sense for adventure have always driven this Nation forward, and I join all Americans in watching what future possibilities are enabled by today’s great achievement.

Yesterday, SBA Administrator Karen Mills, and the four winners of the National Small Business Week Video Contest, participated in a Google+ Hangout moderated by Diana Ransom from Entrepreneur.com. Administrator Mills and the contest winners answered questions from Twitter submitted using the hashtag #WHHangout and discussed the various ways the SBA is helping small business owners, such as special services for veterans, export loans, and loans for acquisitions.

Additionally, the winners - KissTixx, Rodgers’ Banana Pudding Sauce, Rustic Crust, and The Fresh Diet - shared stories about the creation and expansion of their small businesses, and gave tips on how they created the winning video submissions. 

Don’t miss the SBA video contest winners highlights reel and visit SBA.gov for more information about the video contest and how the SBA is supporting small business all across the country.

In his 2012 State of the Union Address, President Obama stated his goal to turn the nation’s unemployment system into a reemployment system.  One way we can do this is to leverage and foster the entrepreneurial spirit of the nation’s unemployed workers, helping those who have lost their job transition to creating jobs.  Included in the payroll tax cut and unemployment insurance legislation the President signed into law in February was a provision called Self-Employment Assistance, or SEA, that allows states to empower unemployed workers to start their own businesses.

The idea is simple:  Some laid-off workers have the skills, experience, and entrepreneurial ambition to launch a successful business, but they are locked into an inflexible system.  If they stop looking for traditional work full-time, they will lose their unemployment benefits.  Instead, SEA allows an entrepreneur with a viable business plan to receive those same unemployment benefits, as long as they are working full-time to get a new company off the ground.  

We know that this model works, because several states have already established successful programs over the past two decades.  In multiple studies, SEA has been shown to increase the success of entrepreneurs, and increased their earnings from self-employment.

Take Rakia Reynolds, who in 2007 found herself laid off from her job as a TV producer in Philadelphia.  She discovered that Pennsylvania would allow her to dedicate herself to the all-consuming process of starting a new business, while continuing to receive unemployment benefits for a limited time to support her family.  She founded the public relations firm Skai Blue Media, and in just a few years hired six employees and established her company as a PR leader in Philadelphia.

Or take Adam Lowry and Michael Richardson, two software developers in Portland, Oregon whose employer went out of business in 2009.  Self-employment assistance allowed them to pursue their entrepreneurial ambitions and launch Urban Airship, an innovative mobile advertising company that now employs 75 workers, and promises to keep on growing.

America is full of potential success stories like these.  As part of the White House-led Startup America initiative to accelerate the success of job-creating entrepreneurs across the country, the President first proposed to expand SEA last September in the American Jobs Act.  TIME called SEA “the most important (and overlooked) proposal” included in the American Jobs Act.  SEA was one of several work-based reforms passed into law in February as part of the first major overhaul of the unemployment insurance system in decades. 

Today, the Labor Department issued technical guidance to put the new law into practice, extending this opportunity to the long-term unemployed, connecting entrepreneurs with mentorship and business development resources through the Small Business Administration and local partners, and giving states the tools to get new SEA programs off the ground.  The goal of this guidance, and of the legislation that generated it, is to give thousands more entrepreneurs the opportunity that Lowry, Richardson, and Reynolds had—to realize their dreams of self-employment, creating profits for themselves and jobs for others in the process. 

Tomorrow the President will travel to TPI Composites in Newton, Iowa where he will highlight steps Congress can take right now to create American jobs, and support American companies and manufacturers – all while continuing to increase clean energy production here at home.   

As part of his Congressional To-Do List, the President will call on Congress to pass legislation that will extend the Production Tax Credit (PTC) – which provides an important tax credit to utility-scale wind producers in the United States – alongside an expansion of the 48C Advanced Energy Manufacturing Tax Credit that supports American-made clean energy manufacturing in towns and cities across the country. According to industry estimates, the wind industry supports nearly 20,000 direct jobs along with over 30,000 manufacturing jobs in its supply chain, and some in industry have estimated that without extending the PTC, as the President is calling for, up to 37,000 jobs could be lost.

At the U.S. Small Business Administration, we have the great privilege to work with many amazing small business owners. Every day I see how small businesses are creating an economy built to last and living the American Dream. I wanted to share these great stories with everyone – so we asked small business owners to share their stories in a short video that demonstrates how their business benefited from the SBA and makes a difference in their local community. 

The response to SBA's first video contest was incredible – we received over 100 submissions! It was a difficult process, but SBA selected four winners to participate in the Google + Hangout with me. Thanks to all contest participants for taking the time from your busy schedules to submit these outstanding videos. We look forward to highlighting all the videos on our website in the coming weeks.

Drum roll please…!

The winners of the 2012 National Small Business Week Video Contest:

KissTixx, Orem, Utah

Dallas Robinson and Mike Buonomo started KISSTIXX Lip Balm as a project in college.  They created a high quality SPF lip balm that was packaged in two compatible flavors, one for you and one for your special someone.  The two flavors would combine on contact creating a new flavor or experience when you kiss.  They have flavors like Fire & Ice that heat and cool the lips, Raspberry & Lemonade and Strawberry Daiquiri & Pina Colada.  As students they needed the help of the SBA to create product to meet the demand.  The SBA stepped up and now KISSTIXX gets inquiries all over the world.  They are currently negotiating deals with major retailers stateside and expanding the kissing experience into over 30 countries.  They were even able to convince celebrity billionaire Mark Cuban to financially back their company.  

Check out this video of KISSTIXX:

Rodgers' Banana Pudding Sauce; Chesapeake, Virginia

Reggie Rodgers is the Managing Director of R.R. Enterprise - better known as Rodgers’ Banana Pudding Sauce, located in Chesapeake, VA.  Reggie is a service-disabled veteran, serving 26 years with the Navy.  In his first year of business, Reggie and his family worked with their local Small Business Development Center in Chesapeake to learn the nuts and bolts of operating a business.  They are now in the process of applying for a Patriot Express Loan, after attending a military community workshop at an SBDC in Hampton, VA.

Check out this video of Rodgers' Banana Pudding Sauce:

This op-ed by Dr. Jill Biden was first published in The Hill

Over the past few years, I have been blessed with the opportunity to spend time with our veterans, troops and military families. With every visit, I come away inspired. 

They are military spouses, who balance work, family and school — all while dealing with the emotions of a deployment. They are military children, who move from school to school while picking up extra chores while their dad or mom is away serving our country. They are survivors of our fallen, who are pillars of strength for their communities. And of course, they are our troops, veterans and wounded warriors, who have dedicated their lives to defending America.

This Memorial Day, we must remember that these heroes are found in every corner of our country, from big cities to rural areas, from base communities to small towns. But no matter where they are assigned or what their duties are, when our service members are called to serve, so too are their families. 

That’s why one year ago, first lady Michelle Obama and I launched Joining Forces, an initiative to bring Americans together to recognize, honor and serve our nation’s veterans and military families. Joining Forces focuses on three key areas — employment, education and wellness — while raising awareness about the service, sacrifice and needs of our troops, veterans and their families. 

When we first started thinking about this concept, we were pretty confident that Americans would answer the call. But the response we’ve seen in our first year has been simply overwhelming. 

When the Internet revolution arrived in the 1990s, the U.S. Government embraced this new medium to interact with the American people.  Today, what started as basic information pages has evolved into sophisticated transactional systems that allow us to pay taxes online, download medical records, and so much more.

Like the 1990s, we are now in the midst of another important shift in how people consume and deliver information and services. In 2011, global smartphone shipments exceeded personal computer shipments for the first time in history, and more Americans will soon access the Internet via mobile devices than desktop PCs. The rise of mobile further compounds the challenge of providing high-quality digital services in a cost-effective and efficient manner.

That’s why President Obama issued a directive today to make important services accessible from your phone and charged me with developing a comprehensive strategy to build a 21st Century Digital Government that delivers better digital services to the American people.

Today marks the launch of that Digital Government Strategy (PDF / HTML5).

At its core, the strategy takes a coordinated, information- and customer-centric approach to changing how the government works and delivers services to the American people. Designing for openness from the start – making open data the default for government IT systems and embracing the use of web APIs – enables us to more easily deliver information and services through multiple channels, including mobile, and engage the public and America’s entrepreneurs as partners in building a better government.

Darla Armstrong is one 25 AmeriCorps members still serving in Joplin.

Darla Armstrong worked in the Joplin School District for 31 years, both as a teacher and administrator.  But all that experience could not prepare her for the events of May 22, 2011.

She was home at the time the EF-5 tornado was expected to hit her neighborhood in the north side of Joplin, but it veered and went straight through the middle of town. Although her home was spared, Armstrong heard that students in the very community she taught had perished from injuries resulting from the tornado that destroyed Joplin High School and more than 7,500 other buildings.

Darla stepped into action amid the total chaos and started volunteering with the Joplin School District. Helping organize logistics at the distribution center set up at the middle school, Armstrong went out to find victims affected by the storm and assess their needs. Eventually, that work led her to begin a new career working with AmeriCorps VISTA and to help the students of Joplin recover.

With 54% of Joplin students affected by the tornado and many living in transitional housing, Darla works feverishly to match the needs of the students and their families with donations available to make life a little bit easier for the victims. To date, Darla Armstrong and her fellow Bright Futures AmeriCorps VISTAs have coordinated and distributed tens of thousands of dollars in donations of supplies, clothing, and other essential for Joplin students.

“The kids are the priority and their families—they don’t have clothes or transportation,” says Armstrong. “Bright Futures picked up the gap between the gap that can’t be met in the middle. So far, I have helped to organize, plan, and attend 9 Sunshine Squads, impacting approximately 550 staff members. "

Since the storm hit, AmeriCorps has had an ongoing presence in Joplin and a long-term commitment to the recovery efforts. In the year since, more than 350 AmeriCorps members from across the nation have served in Joplin. They have removed tons of debris, provided homeowner assistance and casework, operated donation and distribution warehouses, coordinated donations, and managed a large-scale volunteer operation that has coordinated more than 75,000 volunteers to provide more than 520,000 hours of disaster assistance to more than 2,200 Joplin households.

One year after the tornado, more than 25 AmeriCorps members just like Darla are still serving in Joplin, assisting with home building and repair, offering legal services to low-income families, managing volunteers and donations and homeowner requests through the AmeriCorps Recovery Center led by the AmeriCorps St. Louis Emergency Response Team.

Wendy Spencer is the CEO of the Corporation for National and Community Service.

Learn more

• Read about the efforts to rebuild Joplin.
• Watch President Obama's commencement address to the 2012 graduates of Joplin High School.