A group of local high school students devoted a day of gritty, hard work to cleaning up the abandoned residence and beginning the task of converting it into a parental resource center. Lecture halls and laboratories remain the most basic settings for learning, but they are by no means the only place to teach our students. As those Chicago students showed, the entire community is the classroom. The study focused on college students who participate in Learn and Serve America, a service-learning program run by the Corporation for National Service. Those students earned better grades, displayed a greater sense of civic responsibility and developed stronger leadership skills then other students.
Community service is central to the education of hundreds of thousands of students.
Law students at Southern Illinois University volunteer in conflict- resolution programs that help migrant workers and elementary school children avoid resorting to violence when settling their differences. Elementary school students in Maryland raise rockfish to help replenish the feeder streams of Potomac River. No matter what you do or how busy you are, there is always a way to serve a larger community. The story of your generation should be the story of how we restore broken lives and shattered promises through citizen service. At Graceville High School in Florida, Learn and Serve students tutored elementary school students who were struggling with their schoolwork.