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              First Report of the National Evaluation of RSVP Volunteers
      Back
                In 2013, the Corporation for National and Community Service (CNCS) initiated a national evaluation of the Retired and Senior Volunteer Program (RSVP). The national evaluation was intended to collect the necessary information to describe the characteristics of RSVP volunteers, including how volunteers are distributed across CNCS’s performance measure categories, how they allocate their time to different service activities, and if there are differences in engagement in service activities by gender, age, and length of service in the RSVP program.

A sample of 1,499 volunteers was drawn from 33 RSVP grantees; 849 volunteers that completed the survey, yielding an overall response rate of 57 percent.

Findings

The majority of RSVP volunteers survey respondents are white, non-veteran, retired, women, with an income between $20,000 and $40,000, and have earned a bachelor’s degree; respondents served, on average, 8 years. Respondents who were older than 76 served with the RSVP program, on average, 11 years; approximately 42 percent of RSVP volunteer survey respondents engaged in national priority service activities such as support older adults maintain independent living in their home or in group care settings, help young children in an educational setting, or assist in adult education. Another 13 percent engaged in Capacity Building activities; male volunteer respondents younger than 65 years of age were more likely than women to engage in national priority service activities as were those younger than 65 years of age. Approximately 42 percent of the volunteer respondents engaged in service activities that directly support their communities such as neighborhood watch.

      Full report
      

      Full Report
            FR_2015_1stRptNatlEvalRSVPVolunteers.pdf
        Further information
    



      Program/Intervention
                        RSVP
  

      Implementing Organization
                        CNCS
  

      AmeriCorps Program(s)
            AmeriCorps Seniors
  

      Age(s) Studied
            55+ (Older adult)
  

      Outcome Category
            Benefit to national service members/volunteers
                  Improving AmeriCorps
  

      Study Type(s)
            Case Study or Descriptive
  

      Researcher/Evaluator
                        JBS International
  

      Published Year
                        2015 Back to main content Sign up to hear about our latest news, events, and opportunities.
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