For Immediate Release
Contact: Adam Serafin
Cal Poly Student Life and Leadership
805 756-5883 aserafin@calpoly.edu
Judy Botelho, CSU
562-951-4749
Cal Poly Students Volunteer $5M Worth of Time Locally
SAN LUIS OBISPO -- Nearly 10,000 Cal Poly students volunteered in and around San Luis Obispo last year -- performing more than 200,000 hours of community service work worth nearly $5 million locally.
The estimates on student volunteer hours were calculated by Cal Poly's Student Community Services office as part of student applications for the President's Higher Education Community Service Honor Roll, said Adam Serafin of The Community Center at Cal Poly.
Students volunteered through the university's Community Based Learning classes, Student Community Services projects, and Alternative Spring Break Program, as well as university-sponsored Days of Service and philanthropy projects run by Cal Poly's fraternities, sororities and clubs.
A total of 9,500 Cal Poly students volunteered for a total of 223,525 hours of community service work during the 2007-08 academic year, Serafin said.
"The State of California's official estimate of the value of one hour of volunteer work to the community is $21.97," said Serafin. "That means Cal Poly students' volunteer efforts contributed nearly $5 million in service work dedicated to this community."
The exact value of the students' recorded volunteer hours, Serafin said, totals out to $4,910,844.
Cal Poly students are among the nearly 60,000 California State University students who have answered California’s "Call to Service" over the last decade and contributed to their universities and communities, according to a report released recently by the California State University Center for Community Engagement.
In 1998, there were 135,769 students at the CSU's 23 campuses doing community service. Ten years later, some 194,374 students reported participating -- a 43 prercent increase.
A 2007 CSU student survey showed approximately half (46.6 percent) of CSU students said they performed community service or service learning at an average of 6.4 hours per week, totaling 32 million hours of service annually. The economic impact of this service totals $624 million.
“As we know, student involvement in these kinds of community activities increases retention, enhances learning, and leads to success after graduation. I am proud of how much CSU students give back to their communities,” said CSU Chancellor Charles B. Reed.
In the past decade, the CSU has committed significantly to enhancing the in-class academic experiences of students with the real-world, out of class benefits of serving the community through service-learning.
This investment in CSU students’ educational experiences and in California’s communities has had a big impact. Some 148 new service-learning courses were developed last year, bringing the total number of courses offered to 2,575 annually.
Grants and awards received by CSU campuses and the Chancellor’s Office for community engagement activities total $4.3 million, a return on investment of nearly $4 for every dollar invested by the State.
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