The engagement of Oswego State’s students in the community and professors’ use of service learning in classes have again earned the college recognition on the President’s Higher Education Community Service Honor Roll.

The Corporation for National and Community Service bills the honor roll as "the highest federal recognition a college or university can receive for its commitment to volunteering, service learning and civic engagement." Oswego State has been on the annual list four consecutive years, since the honor roll’s inception.

More than 1,300 Oswego State students joined with faculty in projects to meet local needs using the skills gained in their classrooms in 2009, according to data collected by the college’s Center for Community Service and Service Learning. Students contributed about 24,300 hours of service.

Accounting students helped hundreds of taxpayers file their tax forms. Education students tutored at-risk youth and mentored teenage children of migrant farm workers. Students in a gerontology class volunteered in nursing homes, and other students organized anti-hunger campaigns and food drives.

Selection criteria for the President’s Honor Roll include scope and innovation of service projects, percentage of student participation in service activities, incentives for service and the extent to which the school offers service-learning courses.

Oswego State is also a founding member of the New York Campus Compact, a commitment to civic engagement, student involvement and community service.

A day of service is built into welcoming week for new students in the fall. Residents of Hart Hall and Johnson Hall have service-learning requirements, 33 classes have a service-learning component, and many of the 150 student organizations engage in community service.

The President’s Honor Roll recognized more than 700 colleges and universities, 62 from New York state, for their impact during 2009 on issues from poverty and homelessness to environmental justice.