Virginia Tech
PAE-22: Community Service Participation

The President’s Higher Education Community Service Honor Roll defines community service as: "Activities designed to improve the quality of life of off-campus community residents, particularly low-income individuals. Community service activities may include but are not limited to: academic service learning, co-curricular service learning (not part of an academic course, but utilizing service-learning elements) and other co-curricular student volunteer activities, as well as Work-Study community service and paid community service internships. Community service includes both direct service to citizens (e.g., serving food to the needy) and indirect service (e.g., assessing community nutrition needs or managing a food bank)." For more information please see: http://www.learnandserve.gov/about/programs/higher_ed_honorroll.asp In 2009-10, more than 12,600 Virginia Tech students participated in forms of community service other than academic service-learning. Adding in 4,188 students for academic service-learning and the total amounts to 16,788 students. This year the Center for Student Engagement & Community Partnerships initiated the “Seasons of Service” to foster the idea that service / engagement can and should be as natural as the seasons themselves, now and throughout one’s life. Several programs that illustrate this initiative deserve special mention. • The Center for Student Engagement & Community Partnerships, in partnership with the local community and two international nonprofit organizations (Stop Hunger Now and Why Hunger), facilitated a three-day event called “Local Food, Global Hunger: Sharing, Learning, Serving,” that culminated in our “Fall Day of Service,” during which more than 2,000 people, ages 4 to 81, packing over 285,000 meals for the people of Haiti displaced by that nation’s recent earthquake. • Sponsored by the VT Student Government Association, the 2011 Virginia Tech Relay for Life involved nearly 6,000 participants and raised more than $631,000 for cancer research. This event and the Big Event (below) are part of Ut Prosim Month in April, highlighting the spring season, capitalizing on national volunteer week, and honoring those who were killed or wounded in the shooting tragedy of April 2007. • Virginia Tech’s largest day of service event, the 2011 Big Event, enlisted 6,731 volunteers to complete 950 different projects addressing community needs throughout the New River Valley (NRV, the local region). For more information regarding community service at Virginia Tech please see: http://www.vtserves.vt.edu/ http://www.vtserves.vt.edu/Everyone/Engagement/ http://www.engage.vt.edu http://www.outreach.vt.edu/ForYou/lifelonglearning.aspx http://www.socm.vt.edu/ http://cnre.vt.edu/cnr_webpages/engagement.htm http://future.ext.vt.edu/ http://www.cals.vt.edu/news/pubs/innovations/index.php http://www.caus.vt.edu/outreach http://www.pamplin.vt.edu/info/facts.html http://www.eng.vt.edu/outreach http://www.clahs.vt.edu/Outreach/index.html Note: the Total number of students (28,115) reflects Full-Time undergraduate, graduate, and professional students enrolled in the 2010-11 Academic Year.