There's an innovative, inspiring seed being planted in schools here and across the country, one that can help create both better students and better citizens. It's flowering like crazy, as educators anxiously try to reach a generation that is turned off from school - and from society.
Service learning, it is called.
For example, instead of learning about the environment only in a textbook, students in one school measured wind velocity in a neighborhood and then published a brochure on how to weatherize a home. Early studies have shown that students engaged in service learning have better grades, attendance and attitudes toward school than other students. And the gains seem to be greatest among disadvantaged and minority students. But like any newfangled notion in education, the potential to mess up service learning is also there. This is what worries me.