The millennial generation, we are often led to believe, is so self-absorbed, so addicted to personal technology and narcissism, and so exacting in their expectations of what is important to their lives that we shouldn't look for substantial contributions from them.
I disagree.
Student voluntary service, commonly known as service learning, has been a co-curricular feature of American colleges and universities since the 1980s, frequently at small, church-related, liberal arts colleges like mine, Virginia Wesleyan.
Since its inception, service learning has challenged students not only to join the ranks of those helping out at food banks, teaching adults to read or cleaning up parks and roadsides, but also to manage campus service-learning systems and coordinate outreach. After more than a quarter-century of investment by foundations, partnership with nonprofit organizations and development of students' skills and awareness, service learning today on many campuses is as much a part of co-curricular life as athletics and fraternities and sororities.
Indeed, student service has also often become a regular component of the academic curriculum. Virginia Wesleyan's program encourages social responsibility, service and ethical conduct in and out of the classroom. Research shows a correlation between student service and academic and career achievement, leadership development and an inclination to continue voluntary service beyond the undergraduate years.
So when I hear millennials' social awareness being discounted or criticized as being too naively focused, I come back to service learning to make a point: it may be that millennials' greatest legacy lies in their opportunities for service leadership, in learning skills at college that will benefit them and society.
The results can be eye-opening for students and life-transforming for those they serve. Virginia Wesleyan students, for example, helped operate an emergency shelter on campus this winter for 60 homeless adults, managed or served by some 160 volunteers. Tianna Garland, a senior business major, is a shelter manager. "It led to a more compassionate understanding," she recently told our Board of Trustees, "that homelessness can happen to any of us."
Another student, Regina Crichlaw, volunteers at the homeless shelter, works with kids after school and at summer camp and assists patients suffering from dementia, among other activities. Service learning, she says, "places doors in front of me that I constantly want to open."
Students find that the skills gained in service -- teamwork, problem-solving, research -- often transfer to their careers. They take with them the benefits of discipline, social awareness and stewardship, along with immense satisfaction for having touched someone else's life in ways beyond social media.
Colleges and universities benefit from service learning, too. Virginia Wesleyan is welcoming VOLUNTEER Hampton Roads to our campus as a resource for the community, providing further opportunities for internships and student engagement. Our students will also have access to nonprofit and volunteer-management training. An important goal for VWC this year is gaining recognition on the President's Higher Education Community Service Honor Roll. We are also a signatory to the national higher-education service coalition Campus Compact 30th anniversary Action Statement, in part to "affirm Virginia Wesleyan's obligation to contribute to the public good."
Throughout their history, colleges and universities have frequently sought to define their contributions to the community beyond campus. Today in a highly mobile, less fixed society, the difference that individual students can make on their campuses and in their future neighborhoods is a vital component of their education and the mission of their institutions. Everybody wins when students perform good service. And for a generation in need of good reviews and a secure legacy, service learning remains one of the best avenues to their success.
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Dr. Scott D. Miller is President of Virginia Wesleyan College in Norfolk/Virginia Beach. Previously, Dr. Miller served as President at Bethany College in West Virginia (2007-15), Wesley College in Delaware (1997-2007) and Lincoln Memorial University in Tennessee (1991-97).
He wrote this for the February 28 issue of The Virginian-Pilot (Norfolk, VA)