LSU Earns Place on National Honor Roll for Community Service

One of 690 higher education institutions to receive this honor

03/21/2013

BATON ROUGE – LSU has been named to the 2013 President’s Higher Education Community Service Honor Roll. This designation is the highest honor a college or university can receive for its commitment to volunteering, service-learning and civic engagement.

A total of 690 colleges and universities were named to the Honor Roll. These are institutions that reflect the values of exemplary community service and achieve meaningful outcomes in their communities. LSU has received recognition on the Honor Roll annually since its inception in 2006, at which time it was one of six institutions recognized with the Honor Roll’s highest honor, the Presidential Award.

“This is a great example of LSU’s commitment to serve the community as Louisiana’s flagship university,” said interim LSU System President and interim LSU Chancellor William Jenkins. “Engagement is one of the key tenants of Flagship 2020 and this award is a testament to the outstanding efforts of our faculty, staff and students.”

LSU was recognized for its campus-wide commitment to community, with special recognition for the university’s integrated approaches to addressing literacy and promoting healthy communities. LSU was also recognized for service-learning activities facilitated through the Center for Community Engagement, Learning, and Leadership, or CCELL.

Each year, LSU is involved in various efforts to promote financial, reading, environmental and scientific literacy, including initiatives such as Louisiana Sea Grant’s Ocean Commotion program; the Coastal Roots Seedling Nursery program; K-12 classroom visits through Science Demo; individualized reading assistance with Volunteers in Public Schools, or VIPS; and financial education programs in the E. J. Ourso College of Business.

LSU demonstrates its commitment to supporting healthy communities through service initiatives such as free health screenings with Community University Partnership’s Fresh Cuts, Clean Health program; the construction of safe playgrounds through the LSU Community Playground Project; senior health and fitness with the Leo S. Butler Community Center’s Sensational Seniors exercise program; and the comprehensive nutrition and physical activity programming offered by the LSU AgCenter’s Smart Bodies initiative.

Multiple engagement initiatives are facilitated through LSU’s approximately 175 service-learning classes each year, which engage students with community organizations by integrating meaningful service that enhances student learning. Service-learning projects range from bullying prevention programs for middle school students, hands-on work in community gardens and free tax preparation for low-income families. All service-learning courses strive to address community-identified needs.

“Congratulations to LSU, its faculty and students for its commitment to service, both in and out of the classroom,” said Wendy Spencer, CEO of the Corporation for National and Community Service, or CNCS. “Through its work, institutions of higher education are helping improve their local communities and create a new generation of leaders by challenging students to go beyond the traditional college experience and solve local challenges.”

Inspired by the thousands of college students who traveled across the country to support relief efforts along the Gulf Coast after Hurricane Katrina, CNCS has administered the award since 2006 and manages the program in collaboration with the U.S. Department of Education and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, as well as the American Council on Education and Campus Compact.

The Corporation for National and Community Service is a federal agency that engages more than five million Americans in service through Senior Corps, AmeriCorps, the Social Innovation Fund and Volunteer Generation Fund, and leads President Obama’s national call to service initiative, United We Serve. For more information, visit www.NationalService.gov. For a full list of recipients and descriptions of their service, visit www.NationalService.gov/HonorRoll.

Melissa  Foley 
LSU Media Relations
225-578-3869
mfoley@lsu.edu