Assessing the Effects of Voluntary Youth Service: The Case of Teach for America

• Published in: Social forces 2009-12, Vol.88 (2), p.945-969
• Main Authors: McAdam, Doug, Brandt, Cynthia
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Activism; Activists; Adolescents; Alternative Teacher Certification; Attitudes; Case Studies; Citizen Participation; Citizenship; Citizenship Education; Civic education; Civics; Cohort Analysis; College Students; Colleges & universities; Community Relations; Community service; Comparative Analysis; Control Groups; Dropouts; Economic aspects; Educational aspects; Educational services; Employment; Evaluation; Graduates; Job Applicants; Mail Surveys; Occupations; Participation; Political activism; Political aspects; Political Attitudes; Politics; Program Effectiveness; Public Schools; Response rates; School dropouts; Service Learning; Social activism; Social Attitudes; Social behaviour; Social Capital; Social movements; Social problems and social policy. Social work; Sociology; Sociology of the family. Age groups; Studies; Surveys; Teaching; U.S.A; United States of America; Voluntary associations; Voluntary work; Volunteerism; Volunteers; Voting; Well Being; Young Adults; Youth; YOUTH CIVIC ENGAGEMENT: A PAPER AND COMMENTARY; Youth Movements; Youth problems; Youth Programs; Youth volunteers
• ISSN: 0037-7732; 1534-7605
• DOI: 10.1353/sof.0.0279

We use survey data from all accepted applicants to Teach for America 1993–98 to assess the longer-term effect of youth service on participants' current civic attitudes and behaviors. While TFA “graduates” score higher than the two comparison groups— “dropouts” and “non-matriculants” —on a broad range of attitudinal items measuring civic commitment, these differences appear to be less a byproduct of the TFA experience than a reflection of current involvement with the TFA organization. Moreover, the attitudinal differences are not reflected in actual civic behavior. Specifically, graduates lag behind non-matriculants in current service activity and generally trail both non-matriculants and drop-outs in self-reported participation in five other forms of civic/political activity measured in the study. Graduates also vote at lower rates than the other two groups. Finally, fewer graduates report employment in “pro-social” jobs than either non-matriculants or drop-outs. We close by speculating on what mechanisms may help explain variation in the long-term effects of youth service or activist experiences.