I love, love, love this new program Princeton is looking at instituting. They want to send about 10% of their incoming freshman to do a year of service somewhere in the world-before they even get to school! It's basically a gap year, but they would help with financial aid and it would be set up through them. Genious! Why couldn't this have been in place when I went to college? Not that I would have gotten into Princeton, but still. I hope other universities follow suit. It makes so much sense, and could actually do some good-both in the foreign countries and for the kids going.
I do agree with some of the reader comments, though, that some domestic service would be nice as well. Maybe let kids choose?
Read the NY Times article here: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/19/education/19educ.html
