A youth philanthropy board that provides high school students the training and experience to successfully distribute mini-grants in support of service-learning projects in New Haven County.

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SASL History and Current Activities

SASL board members at February board meeting 2006.

Ten students were originally recruited from seven high schools in New Haven County. The students began to meet twice a month with a goal to learn about youth philanthropy in support of service-learning and create a Request for Proposal (RFP) that could be disseminated to New Haven County schools in the fall of 2004. The board named itself Student Activists for Service-Learning (SASL) and identified leadership roles to help guide their activities.

In June of 2006, SASL completed its third school year as a youth-philanthropy board promoting service-learning in New Haven County middle and high schools. The SASL board is represented by 13 high-school students from seven different New Haven County schools. During monthly meetings in 2005-06, the board organized itself to recruit, fund and follow-up on ten projects, which resulted in over 300 students participating in almost 10,000 hours of service-learning and providing service to about 1,150 people.

The SASL board advertises the availability of grant funds through the publication of a Request for Proposal (RFP). The RFP is used to recruit mini-grant applicants in both the fall and spring semester. To rank the grants, the SASL board created a grant-evaluation rubric based on the board priorities established in the RFP. The ranking focused the board’s priorities to support service-learning projects that (1) encouraged student planning and leadership, (2) connected service project clearly to academic objectives, (3) identified meaningful projects that could provide service to people, education and art, places, things and/or the environment, animals, or celebrations for project work and (4) included specific plans for reflection and project evaluation.

Projects funded by SASL have included the Learn and Serve categories of Education, Human Needs, Environment and Health/Nutrition. Selected examples include—(1) an education program at Amity High School where a math teacher sponsored a team of high school girls to meet and mentor junior high girls and encourage their interest and ability using math; (2) a health project where a student council led team from Wolcott High school planned and hosted a blood drive (including an information assembly) that resulted in close to 100 blood donors (many of them students) supporting the effort in recognition of a local student who requires many blood transfusions; (3) an education and human needs project led by students from Hopkins High who met weekly with local seniors to interview them about their past and create an anthology of their historical biographies; and (4) an educational and environmental project sponsored by Common Ground High school where students helped in a large landscaping project completed on the school grounds.

Representatives of SASL have also participated in several other activities that related to their work on the youth-philanthropy board. Board members have presented the mission and objectives of SASL at a statewide hearing in Hartford about after-school programs, SASL board members have engaged in the writing of grant applications to help continue funding the SASL project, board members have presented SASL’s grant evaluation rubric to peers and adults at a New Haven Youth Development Conference, participated in Community Foundation for Greater New Haven Youth Forums and attended the Connecticut Service-Learning Connections conference at Connecticut College in New London. All of SASL’s activities continue to support the development of leadership skills, an understanding of philanthropy and an ethic of community support and engagement. SASL is demonstrating great effectiveness to keep “ethics in action” and welcomes the application of new student board members from New Haven County high schools. A SASL student membership application form (PDF) is available on this website.

Funding for this project has been provided by Connecticut Department of Education’s Learn and Serve program, The Carolyn Foundation, The Community Foundation for Greater New Haven, Connecticut Assets Network, Wright Investors’ Service and private donors.

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