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Commonly used terms/acronyms in the field of Service-Learning.
Academic Component: The classroom portion of service-learning that is generally facilitated by an instructor. While in the classroom, students discuss and/or write about their community service experience as it relates to the goals and objectives of the course.
AmeriCorps: A national service program available to youth and adults 17 years of age and older. In return for serving their communities, participants can earn money toward their college education.
Agency: The establishment, organization or local charity that hosts the community service work. Community service is generally performed at not-for-profit or governmental agencies; when community service is performed at a school, the school is considered the agency.
Beneficiary: The individual, agency, group or community who receives services directly from the community service participant and/or who benefits from services provided.
Chief Academic Officer (CAO): A generic term for the officer in an institution of higher education or academic medicine with specific responsibility for instructional and research affairs. The CAO usually reports directly to the chief executive officer (variously titled president, chancellor, rector, or vice chancellor) of the university, college, or academic medical center in question. In many research universities and colleges in the United States and Canada, the CAO holds the title of provost or "vice president for academic affairs."
Character Education: The effort to develop "good character" in students through the practice and teaching of moral values and decision-making; this is often an intentional outcome or bi-product of service-learning.
Civic Engagement: Individual and collective actions designed to identify and address issues of public concern. Civic engagement can take many forms, from individual volunteerism to organizational involvement to electoral participation. It can include efforts to directly address an issue, work with others in a community to solve a problem or interact with the institutions of representative democracy.
Community-Based Organization (CBO): A nonprofit agency or local charity that is representative of the community which it serves, generally through the provision of human and other community services.
Court-Ordered Community Service: Also known as community restitution or community service orders, court-ordered community service involves the assignment of persons convicted of criminal acts to nonprofit or governmental agencies. Community service orders usually specify a number of hours over a time period established by the court and is imposed as an alternative to incarceration.
Community Service Director (CSD): The person on a campus charged with coordinating student volunteerism and/or service-learning initiatives.
Direct Service: Work directed at the achievement of the agency's primary mission that often involves the provision of services directly to agency clients. Preparing meals at a soup kitchen, cleaning up a neighborhood playground, working as an aid in a childcare center, and tutoring are all examples of direct service.
Indirect Service: Provision of skills and/or work to help an agency perform its functions or to impact upon issues of concern to the agency and the clients/community who it serves. Examples of indirect service include setting up a computer program for agency use, helping with clerical tasks or research for HIV/AIDS for an agency that works in the field of HIV prevention and education.
Intergenerational Program: Programs that bring together participants of different ages. While applicable to relationships between any two generations, the term "intergenerational" today is generally used to connote relationships between children/adolescents and older adults. Intergenerational service brings together youth and adults to work jointly on service projects using the talents and energies of each group to complement and support the other.
Learn and Serve America: A national initiative available to states and localities that integrate service or volunteer work with learning. Learn and Serve America programs have been implemented through schools (K-12 School-based programs), community agencies (Community-Based Organization programs) and colleges and universities (Higher Education programs).
Mandatory Service: Community service which is required as part of an academic program, usually required for graduation from high school and some colleges. School-mandated community service may set required hours, type of service and/or duration. This type of community-service is to be distinguished from court-ordered service defined above.
Mentoring: Mentoring refers to a one-to-one relationship between a more experienced person and a younger person involving mutual commitment, caring and trust. While not a requirement, many mentoring programs encompass community service-learning activities. Mentors help identify opportunities and/or work along side young people in volunteer activities.
Not-for-Profit Agency: A non-governmental organization whose purpose is to address human, environmental and other community concerns and needs. Most not-for-profit agencies are tax-exempt, tax-deductible, and classified as 501(c)(3) institutions. Not-for-profit agencies cannot sell stock, declare dividends or pay their officers or directors other than through salary.
School-to-Work: A system of school-based learning, work-based learning and activities connecting the two in order to prepare youth for the high wage, high skill careers of today's and tomorrow's global economy.
Reflection: Contemplation and consideration regarding the significance of the community service work performed; evaluation of the value and meaning of the specific community service as it relates to a larger context. Structured reflection can take place on an individual or group basis, and is a process that makes meaningful connections of the students service experience to the course content, the community issues, one's values, and the impact on both the individual performing the work as well as the larger society. (Some say this is the learning part of service-learning!)
Service: Work done for the benefit of another person, group of persons, community or agency.
Service-Learning: A teaching method that combines community service with academic instruction as it focuses on critical, reflective thinking and civic responsibility. Service-Learning programs involve students in organized community service that addresses local needs, while developing their academic skills, sense of civic responsibility, and commitment to the community.
Stipend: A modest payment to volunteers to help offset the costs of service.
Volunteer: A person who donates or gives his or her time and talents to provide services to other people, or to the community-at-large.
Volunteer Site Coordinator: An individual who recruits, trains and supervises volunteers. May also be referred to as a community service site supervisor.
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