• Grants for “Youth Engagement Zones”, “not less than $250k and not more than $1m. Eligible partnerships include: a community-based agency, local educational agency, a State Commission or State education agency, local government agency, office of the chief executive officer of a unit of general local government, institution of higher education. Priority given to “eligible partnerships that serve high percentages or numbers of low-income students.” “including partnerships that serve urban, and partnerships that serve rural, communities.” $20m, $30m, $30m, $40m, $40m appropriated for 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013 respectively. The funds must be used for: ’solve specific community challenges’, ‘improve student engagement, including student attendance and student behavior, and student achievement, graduation rates, and college-going rates in secondary schools’, ‘involve an increasing percentage of secondary school students and out-of-school youth in the community in school-based or community-based service-learning activities each year, with the goal of involving all students in secondary schools served by the local education agency and involving an increasing percentage of the out-of-school youth in service-learning activities over the course of 5 years’, ‘encourage participants to continue to engage in service throughout their lives.’
• Grants for “Campuses of Service”, not more than 30 annually. $10m for each fiscal years 2009 through 2013. For 2 or 4 year, public or private institution of higher education.
• Service-Learning Impact study. 10 year longitudinal study on the impact of the activities carried out. Examining student academic achievement, student engagement, graduation rates, the degree to which the participants in the activities engaged in subsequent national service, volunteering, or other service activities. Allocation “such sums as may be necessary for each of fiscal years 2009 through 2013.”
• Sec. 167. Establish the “Commission on Cross-Sector Solutions to America’s Problems.” 21 members. 9 appointed by the President, 3 by Senate majority leader, 3 by Senate minority leader, 3 by Speaker of the House, 3 by the House minority leader. No more than 11 from the same political party. “The Commission shall conduct a thorough study of all matters relating to was in which the Federal Government can work more efficiently and effectively with nonprofit organizations and philanthropic organizations… in achieving better outcomes.” “The Commission may accept, use, and dispose of gifts or donations of services or property.” Terminates after 6 years
• Sec. 167A. “Community Solutions Fund grant program.” Make grants for periods of 5 years, and may renew for 5 years. Not less than $1m not more than $10m. For entities focused on improving measurable outcomes relating to: education for economically disadvantaged students in public schools, child and youth development, reductions in poverty or increases in economic opportunity for economically disadvantaged individuals, health including access to health care and education, resource conservation and local environmental quality, individual or community energy efficiency, civic engagement, reductions in crime. Funds must be matched not less than $1 to $1.
• Sec. 167B. “Innovation Fellowship grants.” “To individuals to pay for the Federal share of carrying out projects in which the individuals establish innovative nonprofit organizations to address national and local challenges.” For periods of 2 years. Not more than $100k. Not more than 25 in a fiscal year.
• To carry out section 167, such sums as necessary. Section 167A: $50m, $60m, $70m, $80m, $100m for 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013 respectively. For 167B: $3.5 for 2009, $5m each year after.
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At various times in American history, public service and private effort

went arm in arm. After Pearl Harbor, Rosie the Riveter and Uncle Sam exhorted people to help the war effort, and Americans responded. But since F.D.R., and especially since J.F.K.’s launching of the Peace Corps, national service has been seen by some as a Democratic or liberal idea. In the ’90s, Newt Gingrich argued that the rise of big government programs robbed people of their initiative to volunteer. After Bill Clinton signed the bill to create AmeriCorps in 1993, then Senator John Ashcroft called it “welfare for the well-to-do.”

But these days there is a growing consensus on Capitol Hill that the private and public spheres can be linked. Democrats understand the need to support programs outside of government; Republicans understand that voluntary programs can be helped by government. In his first State of the Union address after 9/11, President George W. Bush called for Americans to give 4,000 hours of service and established the USA Freedom Corps. One of the early critics of AmeriCorps, John McCain, has since become a devout supporter. “National service is an issue that has been largely identified with the Democratic Party and the left of the political spectrum,” McCain wrote in a 2001 Washington Monthly essay. “That is unfortunate, because duty, honor and country are values that transcend ideology…National service is a crucial means of making our patriotism real, to the benefit of both ourselves and our country.”

THE PLAN

So what would a plan for universal national service look like? It would be voluntary, not mandatory. Americans don’t like to be told what they have to do; many have argued that requiring service drains the gift of its virtue. It would be based on carrots, not sticks — “doing well by doing good,” as Benjamin Franklin, the true father of civic engagement, put it. So here is a 10-point plan for universal national service. The ideas here are a mixture of suggestions already made, revised versions of other proposals and a few new wrinkles.

1. Create a National-Service Baby Bond
2. Make National Service a Cabinet-Level Department
3. Expand Existing National-Service Programs Like AmeriCorps and the National Senior Volunteer Corps
4. Create an Education Corps
5. Institute a Summer of Service
6. Build a Health Corps
7. Launch a Green Corps
8. Recruit a Rapid-Response Reserve Corps
9. Start a National-Service Academy
10. Create a Baby-Boomer Education Bond

Voluntary? Really? How long would that last? How voluntary is the collection of funds to pay for all this proposed government expansion.

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