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The National and Community Service Trust Act of 1993 defines service-learning as:

• A (teaching) method whereby students or participants learn and develop through active participation in thoughtfully organized service that is conducted in and meets the needs of a community;
• Coordinated with an elementary school, secondary school, institution of higher education, or community service programs, and with the community;
• Helping to foster civic responsibility;
• Integrated into and enhances the academic curriculum of the students or the educational components of the community service program in which the participants are enrolled; and
• Providing structured time for the students or participants to reflect on the service experience.

Benefits of Service-Learning

• Provides quality education
• Increases the relevancy of education to students living in the real world
• Enhances personalized education
• Teaches positive values, leadership, citizenship, and personal responsibility
• Empowers students as learners, teachers, achievers, and leaders
• Invites students to become members of their own community

National Statistics

• Across the country, the number of students involved in service-learning has increased by 700,000 over the past 6 years, while funding has remained constant (Learn and Serve America).
• All 50 states have service-learning programs, involving nearly 1.5 million students through the Learn and Serve America program (Learn and Serve America).
• 64% of all public schools now organize some form of community service for their students, and 32% of all public schools organize service-learning as part of their curriculum, including nearly half of all high schools (National Center for Education Statistics, 1999).
• The percentage of all high school students involved in service-learning activities rose from 2% in 1984 to nearly 25 percent in 1997 (University of Minnesota, 1999).
• 83% of schools with service-learning offer some type of support to teachers interested in integrating service-learning into the curriculum, with most providing support for service-learning training or conferences outside of school (National Center for Education Statistics, 1999).
• Most schools with service-learning cited strengthening relationships among students, the school, and the community as key reasons for practicing service-learning (National Center for Education Statistics, 1999).
• Students in over half of the high-quality service learning schools studied showed moderate to strong positive gains on student achievement tests in language arts and/or reading, engagement in school, sense of educational accomplishment, and homework completion (Weiler, LaGoy, Crane, and Rovner, 1998).

Goal of Service Learning
The goal is to blend service and learning so that the service reinforces, improves, and strengthens the learning, and the learning reinforces, improves, and strengthens the service.

The pedagogy of service-learning, at its best, produces a greater impact than either could have produced separately.