I think the progressive politics and community service are increasingly being married to one another in younger generations. At college, I'm on the executive board of a progressively-oriented community service group. We oversee and promote student student volunteering at about 25 volunteer sites in the Chicago area spanning issues such as homelessness, tutoring/mentoring at-risk kids, battered women's shelters, immigrant rights, etc. My job is to plan a quarterly policy lecture series in issues of race, poverty, and inequality, which we try to work around issues faced at our sites (in the past we've brought in some pretty famous faces, including Anna Berger of the Change to Win Coalition).

Also, a lot of people at my school seem to aspire to jobs with employers such as Teach for America or the State Department after graduation.

You know, what I would prioritize over any type of mandatory national service, would be voluntary paid national service anyone could sign up for. We have huge amounts of unmet needs in this nation. And we have huge numbers of people either unemployed or stuck in jobs with truly awful wages and working conditions. Have a non-military national service anyone can join that offers a decent hourly wage plus health care. Use it to meet needs in clean power and energy efficiency, and infrastructure repair and reconstruction in general. By providing a sort of minimum job available to anyone for the asking it would also set limits on how low wages and working conditions offered in private industry could.

Wes Clark...

http://clark04.com/issues/serviceplan

http://clark04.com/issues

http://clark04.com/vision

because it seems like Edwards has been using Clark's plans and words when he has been talking about national service, security and world affairs.

I believe that Wes Clark has been talking with some if not all of the Democratic candidates.

Wes Clark...

http://clark04.com/issues/serviceplan

http://clark04.com/issues

http://clark04.com/vision

I like Dodd. He is one candidate I would like to see make some gains in the polls.

As much as we all made fun of him for getting into this thing--

He has really shown himself to be a decent candidate-- and...

Let's see:

Edwards continues his slide.
Richardson obviously isn't up to it as a political figure.
Obama can't get it together and continues misfiring.
And we're down to Dodd vs. Hillary.  

Stranger things have happened than for the un-Hillary crowd to unite around Dodd.

Interesting.

I'm not sure, but don't the countries with mandatory national service have it because it was an immediate replacement for conscription?

I used to think this sort of thing was a good idea.  After seeing what Bush/Cheney have done with the National Guard, a resource that is supposedly controlled by the States and only federalized in cases of extreme emergency, I no longer think that having a large corps of draftees available to any Administration is safe for our country or its citizens.

sPh

My sister's been involved in service learning for more than a decade now, which the ever-helpful wikipedia describes thus:

Service-learning is a method of teaching, learning and reflecting that combines academic classroom curriculum with meaningful service, frequently youth service, throughout the community. As a teaching methodology, it falls under the category of experiential education. More specifically, it integrates meaningful community service with instruction and reflection to enrich the learning experience, teach civic responsibility, encourage lifelong civic engagement, and strengthen communities for the common good.

Service learning is an idea that's spreading, slowly but surely.  My paper recently did a piece about local high school kids who worked on political campaigns last fall as part of their service learning program.  The entire Los Anglees School District has recently adopted a service learning requirement, but this school already had a program in place years ahead of time.

Now to take this idea one step beyond.  A decade ago, the President of Bard College, Leon Botstein wrote a book, Jefferson's Children in which he advocated the abolition of high school.  An excerpt from Kirkus Reviews:

Among the new realities he cites is the fact (or maybe factoid) that the onset of puberty is now much earlier than it used to be. Our system was created in an era when children matured later. Consequently, Botstein advocates abolishing high school altogether. At 16, students would be dispersed into different kinds of educational options: four-year college for some, community college for others; vocational and professional training or national service would also be options. Teachers should be trained in a discipline rather than in "education," and they should be better paid. We must break down the irrational preoccupation so many college-bound students (and their parents) have with getting into the "best" schools. A good undergraduate education is a good education, no matter whether it comes from the Ivy League or a less prestigious institution. Though this book is not destined to be popular among high- school administrators, Botstein makes a strong, shrewd, sensible case for his radical proposals.

Teenages are always being told how they have to "be responsible," but mostly this is just grownup code for being sheep.  I think most teenagers hunger for the opportunity to actually be responsible, not in a robotic way, but in a way that engages and facilitates their emerging sense of self.  I'm not saying this is the answer.  Botstein suggests an array of options, and I certainly think that a diverse mix of service options tapping into people's skills at different life-stages is a good idea as well.  I am saying that we ought to open ourselves up to thinking about this on a larger scale, in a brain-storming kind of mode.

This is something that a presidential candidate, even one trying to be a bit visionary, can't reasonably be expected to do.  They have to put out ideas that are reasonably compact.  Grand visions that involve trying to address mutiple problems or issues at one time are much easier to shoot down than to nurture in a campaign environment.

But we are under no such limitations.  I'd like to see us think of this not in terms of one candidate's ideas versus anothers, but in terms of how we can advance some innovative ideas that can impact multiple issues and problems at once.  It's worth noting, btw, that younger "millenial voters" have a distinctively higher orientation in this direction in the first place.  It's always good to ride a horse in the direction it's going.

A national service plan that is mandatory would probably be held to be unconstitutional.  Not gonna happen.  No sense in even debating it.  Just implement a voluntary one with enough incentives to get kids to do it.

The idea of national service for the national good is laudable, but tepid.

The notion of linking the inherent benefit of living in America (often viewed as an entitlement) with national service is a generational throw-back to a time when citizens perceived a clear national threat, and were willing to sacrifice out of a basic belief that they were all in this together.

This is a different time. The perceived threats are personal rather than national.

Many people who want to attend college don't because they can't afford the cost. Many others who do attend often incur an outrageous debt burden for most of their working lives. A growing number of Americans have no health care or are under insured. The job opportunity magnet that once drew many Americans to pursue careers in technology and science has been turned off by corporations who use government policies to hire low-paid foreign workers over willing and qualified American workers. And so on.

A better idea is to link voluntary national service to a tangible, personal benefit, like tuition-free undergraduate eduction. This is a bold idea that provides a meaningful linkage between benefit and service. Moreover, this initiative would teach a new generation how effective government can play a meaningful role in peoples lives.

Steve Shafarman wrote a book in 1999 (?), Healing Politics: Citizen Policies and the Pursuit of Happiness, advocating that every citizen be required to perform 8 hours of service each month and in exchange every person would receive a monetary grant large enough to live a decent, though minimal, life (shelter, food, healthcare).

Here is a description of his plan.

I have concerns about this idea, but I also find it intriguing. It raises lots of issues and ideas about what it means to be a citizen in a society/country. What are the benefits/entitlements and what are the responsibilities?

Why do these plans always obligate those who are too young to vote for or against them.

Probably because most of us feel that "kids today" are lazy, slothful or dangerous and we feel we have the solution to all their problems.

Show me a candidate with a plan that obligates every American to community service (instead of just teenagers) and I'll show you a man heckled from the stage.

I too find Sen. Dodd's national service plan intriguing, if a bit implausible. More realistic and feasible is the idea to build a Public Service Academy as a civilian counterpart to the military academies. Although Sen. Clinton has spoken about the Academy on the stump, the movement to build it extends far beyond her or her campaign. Check it out:
http://www.uspublicserviceacademy.org

The Academy would address immediate and long-term needs in the public sector, it would offer service opportunities outside of the military, it would provide a free college education to young people interested in service, and it would be doable.