Service Learning Enhances Education for Young Adolescents: Service Learning Can Reinforce Learning for Middle Grades Students, Launch Them into the Process for Independence in a Prosocial Manner, and Develop the Competencies and Civic Skills They Need as They Move toward Adulthood

The numbers are staggering. Across the United States, nearly one in three high school students fails to graduate. Among minority students, the problem is even more severe: Nearly 50% of black and Hispanic students do not complete high school on time. A young person drops out of school every 26 seconds, which means that about 7,200 students disappear from our schools every school day. However, students often decide to leave school long before they reach high school. Too often, the choice to drop out is made during the middle school years when students decide that school really isn't for them. Students begin sending signals that they are off the path toward graduation as early as 6th grade, according to researcher Robert Balfanz. In Putting Middle Grades Students on the Graduation Path, he identifies factors that indicate students have low odds of graduation: found that 6th graders who failed math or English/reading, or attended school less than 80% of the time, or received an unsatisfactory behavior grade in a core course had only a 10% to 20% chance of graduating on (2008: 4). The consequences of dropping out are tragic for students. According to a report from America's Promise Alliance, those who drop out are more likely to be incarcerated, rely on public programs and social services, and go without health insurance than those who graduate from high school (Swanson 2009). Experts also say that dropping out of high school affects not just students and their families, but the country overall, including businesses, government, and communities. The Alliance for Excellent Education (2009) estimates that high school dropouts from the Class of 2009 will cost the United States more than $335 billion in lost wages, taxes, and productivity over their lifetimes. But why do students choose to leave school when the negative implications of those choices are so great? As part of surveys for the landmark report, The Silent Epidemic (Bridgeland 2006), students who dropped out reported that they lacked a connection to school. Surprisingly, nearly half (47%) said the major reason they dropped out was simply that classes were not interesting. In the Gallup Student Poll (Lopez 2009), half of the students polled reflected a sense of hopelessness for the future or lacked a sense of engagement or enthusiasm for school. Can we change students' perception that school is boring? Can we engage them in ways that don't sacrifice the content and skills students need to be successful in postsecondary education and in the workforce? Can we create learning opportunities that address the developmental characteristics of young adolescents? Yes. And one way to do this is through service learning. The educational opportunities we provide students must align with what the research tells us about the characteristics and needs of young adolescents regarding their physical, cognitive-intellectual, moral, psychological, and socioemotional development. According to This We Believe: Keys to Educating Adolescents, Young adolescents undergo more rapid and profound personal changes between the ages 10 and 15 than at any other time in their lives. Although growth in infancy is also very extensive, infants are not the conscious witnesses of their own development (NMSA 2010: 5). Service learning goes to the heart of what we know about young adolescents. For example, research finds that young adolescents prefer active over passive learning. They prefer interactions with peers. Although they may seem uninterested in conventional academic subjects, they are intellectually curious about the world, and they respond positively to opportunities to connect what they are learning to participation in real-life situations such as community service projects; and ... are generally idealistic, desiring to make the world a better place and to make a meaningful contribution to a cause or issue larger than themselves (NMSA 2010: 57-58). …