1. Young people and Community services :
Young Volunteers: The Benefits of Community Service
http://www.unce.unr.edu/publications/files/cd/2003/fs0323.pdf
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Community_service
Volunteering/Community Service
Benefits of Volunteering
A fact sheet by Davila and Mora investigates the effect of school required community service on academic performance. The authors found positive links between the two, providing solid research for community service advocates.
* Students who participated in school required community service were 22 percentage points more likely to graduate from college than those that did not and were more likely to have improved their Reading, Math, Science, and History scores.
* Similarly, students who performed voluntary community service were 19 percentage points more likely to graduate from college than those that did not.
Read more results about the positive link between civic engagement and educational attainment here.
A CIRCLE working paper by Andrea Finlay and Constance Flanagan finds a link between educational progress and volunteering for young adults (after high school age).
A CIRCLE fact sheet finds that volunteering also seems to ease the transition to civilian life for returning veterans.
Volunteering Trends & Statistics
The actual rate of youth “volunteering” is controversial, because definitions of the term vary and each survey produces different levels. Probably the most reliable estimate comes from the Census annual Current Population Supplement, as analyzed by CIRCLE. (See Fig. 1 below.) These data suggest that the volunteering rate for young adults is around 20%, although other surveys yield higher rates. All surveys find a gap in the volunteering rate between those who attend college and those who do not.
According to CIRCLE’s own 2006 Civic and Political Health of the Nation, 36% of young people, ages 15 to 25, volunteered in the past year.1
Of these young volunteers, only...