Service-learning to Promote Social Justice and Mental Health
S-L can be designed to elevate social justice for youth, build civil society, and promote positive youth development. At its traditional core, S-L is a structured method of instruction, integrated into students’ academic curriculum, by which youth learn through active participation in service experiences that meet their community’s most urgent and critical needs. By its deliberate focus on social awareness, S-L emphasizes community problem-solving through critical thinking about the roots of social inequality, and encourages youth to examine and influence historical, social, political, and economic decisions that sustain, exacerbate, mitigate, or resolve social inequities (Ginwright & Cammarota, S-L is most impactful when students assume ownership over both service and learning (Fredericks, Three of the eight S-L Standards for Quality Practice (NYLC, S-L inclusive of reflection, academic instruction, and youth-adult partnerships shows increasing promise to benefit youth academic (Fredricks et al., For example, an open trial of a S-L curriculum delivered to high school students (