Points of Light Foundation
From Service-Learning Wiki
Founded in May 1990, the Points of Light Foundation and Volunteer Center National Network is a national non-profit organization whose mission is “to engage more people more effectively in volunteer community service to help solve serious social problems.” As part of its mission, the Foundation promotes service programs and service-learning curricula.
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Service-Learning in POLF
The Points of Light Foundation and Volunteer Center National Network’s 2004-2009 strategic plan anticipates “a heightened demand for service-learning opportunities” in the United States, which The Foundation’s Youth and Family Outreach department aims to meet by “building the knowledge and skills of organizations and institutions to create meaningful service and leadership opportunities.” The Foundation has multiple roles in promoting high-quality service-learning programs. It provides technical assistance, training, and products. It also plays an important role in developing “turnkey” programs, which it then can use nationally, across its large network.
The Foundation develops and promotes service-learning partnerships and curriculum through its programs. For example, the Foundation operates a community-based program called Service-Learning Impacting Citizenship Curriculum, which includes issue-based service-learning modules related to social problems such as hunger. The Foundation’s Patrick Doyle explains that, through this curriculum, the Foundation aims to use service-learning as a springboard for getting students to be active citizens, including teaching them basic civic skills and structures of government.
The Foundation supports the diverse roles community-based organizations can play in service-learning programs with schools and on their own. In the school agency partnerships model, schools have important roles in driving service-learning programs’ education agendas. Additionally, many community-based organizations incorporate all of the critical elements for successful service-learning with little or no assistance from schools. The Foundation supports diverse models of community-based service-learning which cover a variety of issues. The Foundation’s Cynthia Scherer says that they have identified commonalities across the varied service-learning models that it promotes.
From those identified commonalities, the Foundation has codified critical elements of successful service-learning. While not all offerings are explicitly called “service-learning,” Scherer stresses that effective youth service actually has the benefits of service-learning if it incorporates those same critical elements.
Scope of Service-Learning
Today, more than 350 volunteer centers throughout the United States are members of the Foundation. In addition, 1,200 local Points of Light Youth Leadership Institute trainers have been certified and, in turn, have trained over 15,000 young people in the Foundation’s service-leadership curriculum.
Intended Outcomes
Through its Youth Leadership Institute, Kids Care Clubs, Service-Learning Impacting Citizenship, Youth Ready to Respond, and other programs, the Foundation hopes to instill a “spirit of service and philanthropy” in young people. In addition to individual program evaluation, the Foundation measures the impact of its efforts by conducting a survey of its network members every other year, measuring the preparedness of the infrastructure that supports service-learning and the engagement, funding levels, participation rates, and number of partnerships with schools. The survey has documented increased participation in service-learning across the Foundation’s network. The survey also shows that youths are the largest group of people participating in volunteer center programs.
References
- Growing to Greatness (2005). St.Paul: National Youth Leadership Council. PDF
