With voluntarism on rise comes a chance to seize the day
Much of the nation’s economy may be continuing to struggle, but one area is still going strong: volunteering.
New data from the Corporation for National and Community Service make clear that even in hard times - particularly in hard times - there’s something about the American character that pulls us together, inspiring neighbors to help neighbors and citizens to give back to their communities.
Nearly 62 million Americans dedicated 8 billion hours of service in 2008, a tally that works out to a monetary value of $162 billion but of course cannot be measured in purely financial terms. What we do know is that service is up across a wide range of the demographic spectrum: for both men and women, and across ethnic groups and age ranges. There has been a particular spike - nearly one-third - in Americans taking the initiative to address a need in their neighborhood, and getting others involved in the process. And young people are leading the way. The current generation is one of the most socially conscious in history. The number of young adults (age 16 to 24) who volunteered increased by more than 441,000 from 2007 to 2008, to more than 8.2 million.
Massachusetts embodies this trend. Overall, the state ranked 33d in volunteerism, but among those age 16 to 24 the state ranked eighth nationally, led by a remarkable 28 percent volunteer rate in the Boston metropolitan area. These future leaders, many of whom are college students, provided nearly 111 million hours of service last year alone.
Boston is also the epicenter of the organizations driving the national community service movement, the home to groundbreaking organizations like CityYear, YouthBuildUSA, and Citizen Schools. Legislation authorizing the greatest expansion of national service since the Great Society, signed into law in April, was named for Senator Edward M. Kennedy.
For the nonprofit community, there are important lessons in the data. First, volunteer labor is a critical resource. The recession has increased demand for services while private charities must cope with budget cuts - a painful double-whammy. Volunteers have played a critical role in helping cover the gap, and we must continue to reach higher, because needs will continue to grow.
That means making sure that people who want to pitch in can quickly and easily find opportunities to do so. This requires more than just good intentions. Nonprofit organizations have a responsibility to scale up their operations to accommodate newcomers or refer them to organizations that can. It is important to understand volunteers’ expectations and work to meet them, lest we risk souring new recruits on the experience in general. We still suffer from a “leaky bucket’’ problem, with one-third of all volunteers dropping out last year.
Fortunately, it doesn’t have to be that way. The Kennedy Serve America Act authorized the tripling of AmeriCorps and significant new investments in strengthening America’s civic infrastructure. Congress is considering appropriations for the act (and President Obama’s overall budget request for national service); we urge funding that is responsive to the original vision of the overwhelming bipartisan majorities that passed it into law.
The White House and the Corporation for National and Community Service have also created Serve.gov, a website designed to use ZIP codes to quickly and easily connect eager volunteers with opportunities in their communities. That site is part of “United We Serve,’’ an initiative that began on June 22 and is aimed at focusing attention on 81 days of collaborative service in communities across the country, culminating in a day of national service on September 11. We hope the initiative will become an on-ramp to a lifetime commitment to service and civic involvement.
While government can play a helpful supportive role in national service, it can’t be everything to everybody, or be in every place at once. That’s why we need active and engaged citizens to step up and do their part. We believe that service is a key to achieving our national priorities, and that our nation is in the midst of a once-in-a-generation redefinition of its civic values.
Alan Solomont is chairman of the board of the Corporation for National and Community Service. Steve Goldsmith is the board’s vice chairman, a former mayor of Indianapolis, and a professor at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government. 