Community Service Definition
Community services are defined as services that are identified by an institution of higher education through formal or informal consultation with local nonprofit, government, and community-based organizations, as designed to improve the quality of life for community residents, particularly low-income individuals, or to solve particular problems related to their needs. These services include:
- fields such as health care, child care, literacy training, education (including tutorial services), welfare, social services, transportation, housing and neighborhood improvement, public safety, crime prevention and control, recreation, rural development, community improvement, and emergency preparedness and response;
- work in service opportunities or youth corps under AmeriCorps, and service in the agencies, institutions, and activities described later;
- support services for students with disabilities (including students with disabilities who are enrolled at the school1); and
- activities in which an FWS student serves as a mentor for such purposes as tutoring, supporting educational and recreational activities, and counseling, including career counseling.
To be considered employed in a community service job for FWS purposes, an FWS student does not have to provide a “direct” service. However, the student must provide services that are designed to improve the quality of life for community residents or to solve particular problems related to those residents’ needs. A school may use its discretion to determine what jobs provide service to the community, within the guidelines provided by the statute, regulations, and the Department.
The definition of community services for FWS includes work in “service opportunities” or “youth corps,” as defined in Section 101 of the National and Community Service Act of 1990:
Service opportunity. A program or project, including a service learning program or project, that enables students or out-of-school youth to perform meaningful and constructive service in agencies, institutions, and situations where the application of human talent and dedication may help meet human, educational, linguistic, and environmental community needs, especially those relating to poverty.
Youth corps program. A program, such as a conservation corps or youth service program, that offers full-time, productive work (to be financed through stipends) with visible community benefits in a natural resource or human service setting and that gives participants a mix of work experience, basic and life skills, education, training, and support services.
The definition of “community services” also includes service in agencies, institutions, and activities that are designated in Section 124(a) of the National and Community Service Act of 1990. These include the following conservation corps and human services corps programs, as well as programs that encompass the focus and services of both.