NOTE: President Corrigan delivered the following speech to the San Francisco Rotary Club on Oct. 3, 2000.

Thank you, Jane. It is a pleasure to be here today to share with you some of my thoughts and experiences over what is now more than 12 years as president of San Francisco State University. When I moved from the University of Massachusetts at Boston to take up this post in September 1988, I had no idea that this place and this university would be so compelling that I would still be here today, happily embarking on my 13th year at San Francisco State. As you may have read, the average term of office these days for college and university president is more like four or five years. What has kept me here -- what keeps me as keenly interested as when the job was new -- is my conviction that San Francisco State University, like the Bay Area itself, is at the forefront of some key trends in higher education, trends that are important well beyond our campus boundaries.

I could talk today about San Francisco State's role in one of the most positive trends I've seen in recent years -- the recognition by colleges and universities that their educational responsibility starts many years before students reach our classrooms -- that we in higher education have to get actively and closely involved with K-12 education if we want to see a turnaround in the dismal national picture of students who have trouble reading, writing, doing math -- and if we want to end the need for college -- level basic skills remediation.

I could talk about how San Francisco State has very deliberately become a nationally-recognized pipeline for students of color -- the term "minorities" no longer fits -- into some of the best science Ph.D. programs in the country and from there, into university research and teaching careers. Colleges and universities across the nation are seeking to diversify their faculties, as they have their student populations, and we are playing an important role in "growing" that next generation of diverse scholars.

I could talk about how technology is affecting teaching and learning, or about how higher education is responding to public demands for assessment and accountability.

But I am not going to talk about any of these things today. Instead, I want to focus on a national movement in higher education that I find as personally exciting -- and potentially transformative - as anything I have experienced in some four decades in this profession.

Let me start by describing a problem. From many quarters, we are hearing a chorus of concern that something is going awry with the very basis of our democratic society: widespread, active participation in civic affairs. From student unions to Silicon Valley we're seeing growing evidence that people are choosing to retreat into their own lives, electing not to engage with social issues, with the community life around them. Lately, we've all been reminded that many Americans aren't even bothering to vote -- that most basic and easiest -- of civic acts. And I read on Sunday that a Harvard poll has found that 49 percent of respondents were paying "no" or "only a little" attention to the presidential race.

One of the most interesting things I've read on this subject lately is Harvard University Professor Robert Putnam's article -- which he has just expanded into a book -- called "Bowling Alone." The title comes from Putnam's interesting discovery that while there has been an enormous increase in bowling by individuals in recent decades, the number of American bowling leagues has decreased significantly. Putnam goes on to note that virtually every volunteer or civic organization, from the PTA to the Elks Club (and everything in between) has witnessed a similar decline. We are, as a nation, disconnecting ourselves from social networks and civic life.

The problem is particularly acute when it comes to young people. National surveys of college students show us a paradox. Although individual student volunteer activity is at an all-time high, participation in civic life has dropped precipitously. The figures on voting by young people are truly frightening -- in 1996, only 28% of the 18-24 year old population voted. And voting isn't the only issue. A year ago, the annual national survey of college freshmen by UCLA's Higher Education Research Institute revealed the lowest levels of political interest since the survey began in 1966.

Our democracy depends on the readiness of each new generation to take personal responsibility for the governance of society. We have an obligation to turn things around again, and through the movement known as civic engagement, I believe we can.

Civic engagement is a commitment by the entire campus to instill in students the values -- and the skills -- that will make them active citizens. We intend to graduate men and women who are prepared -- and eager -- to make ours a better and more just society; who believe in something and will act on those beliefs; who will vote, volunteer, and be active in civic affairs.

How to do this? We start with an approach to teaching and learning that goes by the rather dry name of "service learning." In practice, service learning is anything but dry. Service learning gives students the chance to apply what they are learning out in the community. They undertake a community project that ties in directly with their academic work, and bring the insights and experiences they gain in the community back into classroom discussion, so that their education is, in part, shaped by that community involvement.

I can't think of a better way to show you just how powerful service learning can be -- both for students and for the community -- than to tell you about San Francisco State University student Cecilia Shepard. Cecilia, a 38-year-old public housing resident and single mother of five, who admits she was once a drug addict, achieved phenomenal gains for herself and the mostly black residents of the Hayes Valley housing complex here in San Francisco as she combined the resources of the community and of the University with her own extraordinary energy and talent.

Utilizing two San Francisco State service learning courses, one in political science, the other in health education, Ceci is helping to change her community -- bringing a University health program right into her housing project, getting 500 computers privately donated and installed by HUD in every apartment, with SFSU computer science students (in yet another service learning course) lined up to provide on-site training for both adults and youngsters. For her part, Ceci Shepard describes her service learning classes as "phenomenal."

That is, clearly, an exceptional example -- and it won Ceci a national award -- but let me give you some others that demonstrate the way service learning more typically works.

• San Francisco State students in a philosophy department bioethics course spend time with hospice patients, then bring their experiences to the class discussion of ethical issues in terminal care.
• Through a collaboration between our Multimedia Studies Program, IBM, the United Way, and others, San Francisco State students in an advanced Web design course created commercial-quality Internet sites for service organizations that could not have afforded to hire those services.
• A San Francisco State University finance class team entered a City-sponsored competition to produce a design and financing package for affordable senior housing -- and won first place! Our team got special praise for the way they worked with a non-profit housing developer, with the neighborhood, and with others in the community -- including Mayor's Office staff and the Bank of America. The project is going forward -- there is a reasonable chance that it will actually be constructed!

As these examples suggest, service learning can work in virtually any discipline. San Francisco State currently offers more than 100 service learning courses, in 41 different departments.

Students who have had experiences such as these begin to learn their power to navigate the complexities of community activism; to listen, learn, and partner; and to make things happen. They can be forever changed. And they are well on their way to the kind of lifelong engagement with social issues and community affairs that we are seeing to generate.

San Francisco State is, of course, not the only campus doing this, nor is it altogether new. In fact, American higher education has deep historical roots in a value-based mission: Harvard was created to educate ministers to guide their congregations and help shape the greater society. Penn's founder, Benjamin Franklin, called service "the great aim and end of all learning." The great land grant universities were defined at their creation as partners in service with their communities.

What is new is the way universities across the nation are thoughtfully working service into the curriculum, carefully assessing its educational -- not just social -- value. The truly wonderful thing about service learning is the way it strengthens learning. Service learning is concrete and evidence-based, and the outcomes of the service experience -- for both the student and the community partner -- are assessed as part of the course. For the student, the learning gains are significant. Repeated national studies have shown that students absorb knowledge better when they are given hands-on opportunities to apply it. Students engaged in service earn higher grades and have better graduation rates. Service learning also builds problem-solving skills and a wealth of other real-life capacities.

Through service learning, our students can get the full educational package: subject matter mastery, strong social values, and the skills to apply both in the world beyond the campus.

We are fulfilling -- in fact, enhancing -- our academic goals, and we are finding a way to build the qualities of character and the social values that we also recognize as part of our educational mission.

Just this year, with the passage of the State budget, service learning in California took a great leap forward. You may have read that, a year ago, Governor Davis challenged our State's three systems of public higher education -- the community colleges, the California State University and the University of California -- to institute a service requirement for graduation. The CSU was the only system to respond, and we eventually convinced the Governor that providing more service learning opportunities for students, rather than mandating service was the way to go.

The CSU has been deeply engaged in service learning, and the Chancellor's Advisory Group on Service Learning, which I chair, assisted by two service learning veterans from San Francisco State, developed a plan for the whole CSU that won the Governor's strong support -- $8.8 million dollars worth of support, no less. Governor Davis made that four-year commitment to the CSU to enable our 22 campuses to double the number of service learning courses we offer and double the number of students who have at least one service learning experience before graduation.

You might wonder: Why wait till students enter college? And what about students who aren't college-bound? The answer is that we aren't waiting. From kindergarten on, students can build their civic skills, making active connections between what they are learning and the needs of their communities. A week from now, I'll be addressing a California State University conference designed to help us build service learning into our teacher-training programs. Education faculty from every CSU campus will be working on ways that we can help future K-12 teachers make service learning a part of their classes.

This effort has been prompted in part by Superintendent of Public Instruction Delaine Eastin, who has called on California's school districts to build service learning into the K-12 curriculum. Her initial goal: that by 2004, half of the State's school districts will offer all students at least one service-learning opportunity at the elementary, middle, and high school levels.

For this to happen successfully, we have to start where teacher preparation starts -- in the teacher credential programs of our colleges and universities. The CSU prepares the overwhelming majority of the state's K-12 teachers, and so we are gathering our teacher education leaders to find ways to adapt what we have learned about service learning for grade and high school classrooms. This is tremendously exciting. Imagine an unbroken chain -- from kindergarten through college graduation -- of community service experiences that help our children learn, help them find their place in the world, and make them superb custodians of our future.

I have described some ambitious goals to you today. And before I close, I need to make clear that educating students for lifelong civic engagement is the business of a whole campus -- not just the faculty. Once again, it takes a village -- the whole university village. I mean by this that the whole campus needs to demonstrate the civic values we preach. One timely example: Election season gives us a tremendous opportunity, and at San Francisco State, we've put together a voter registration and get out the vote campaign that has student government, student clubs, the faculty union, many individual faculty and staff -- and even the bookstore -- working together.

I sent an e-mail to all students with a message urging them to register and linking them to on-line registration sites. A broadcasting professor has given his class the assignment of developing persuasive public service announcements to get out the vote. There's undoubtedly much more going on that I haven't heard about -- individual efforts that say to students: We value this way of participating in our shared society. We want you to value it, too. Vote any way you like, but vote.

Throughout California, we are bringing a more diversified population of students to our K-12 schools and college campuses than ever before-the future leaders of our community. Thus, this mission-preparing new generations of principled and active citizens-has become absolutely critical. It is also one of the most exciting things I see unfolding on my campus, throughout this State, and on campuses across the nation.