The Employment Impacts of Service-Learning Classes

A large-scale movement is underway in higher education to incorporate academic service-learning experiences into the curriculum. Decades of research across a range of disciplines and institutional contexts has shown this pedagogy’s positive effects on student outcomes such as personal and civic development, critical thinking, inter-cultural competence, and more. However, there are no adequate studies of the benefits of such courses in terms of employment and earning outcomes for students. This study addresses that gap through a careful examination of the self-reported employment records of a set of over 500 college students over the first two years post graduation. Using unique matching of the sample individuals and several statistical tests, this research investigate the differences between students who take service-learning classes and their counterpart on various aspects such as time needed to employment, starting salary, chances of getting raise and promotion and so on. This study has the potential to validate university and student investment in service-learning coursework beyond the pedagogy’s demonstrated impacts on student social, cognitive, and civic outcomes. Results will represent the first scientific estimates of the economic benefits of service-learning classes.