Providing opportunities for students to contribute to the community can transform the way young people participate—inside and outside the classroom. Positive community experiences, in turn, improve academic engagement and performance. And adults benefit by seeing that young people are capable of achieving a lot more than they may have imagined. Around the country, students are truly leading the way in forging solutions to global and local problems—from racial inequity and climate change to gun violence and food insecurity.

Service learning involves integrating classroom studies with meaningful community service. This goes beyond cleaning up local parks and handing out fliers. Meaningful involvement means spotting problems, designing solutions, managing projects, and leading teams. Through projects like these, adolescents can make a difference in their own lives and the lives of others. And their involvement is more important today than ever, as our society and economy recover from a global pandemic.

Research suggests that students’ sense of agency in the world correlates with higher academic performance. Surveys of 6th to 12th graders by the Quaglia Institute for School Voice and Aspirations have found that students who feel a strong sense of purpose are far more likely than others to say they are highly motivated academically. Seeing that their ideas, opinions, and attitudes can make a difference in the world, beginning with their own school and locality, can be a powerful driving force in young people’s learning experience.

“For the first time in my life, I am able to see the youth leading the way.”

Nyliah Morrison, a student at Brooklyn Laboratory High School, on taking part in March for Our Lives, March 2018