Differential Outcomes for American College Students Engaged in Community Service-Learning Involving Youth and Adults

Abstract

The Serve Program at Ignatius University is a community service-learning program that combines academic study of philosophy with a year-long field-based project at one of approximately 50 different sites. Half of these projects entail working with youth, while the other half entail working with adults. This mixed methods analysis found that college students engaged in adult-oriented service demonstrated larger shifts in public service motivation and belief in a just world than their peers engaged in youth-oriented service. Qualitative interviews with participating students suggest that these differences may be due to the disparate expectations of participants who entered into their respective service experiences.