WASHINGTON D.C. - To mark the 40th Anniversary of Volunteers in Service to America (VISTA), the Corporation for National and Community Service is launching a study to assess the long-term effects of the program on the behaviors and attitudes of its participants.

The study will assess how, and to what extent, VISTA service affected participants’ civic attitudes, life decisions, goals, values, and enduring habits of civic engagement. The study will compare VISTA volunteers to a demographically similar group to see whether they are more civically engaged; whether their attitudes toward service and volunteerism have changed over time; whether they pursued different types of careers; and whether their experience had an intergenerational effect by helping to shape the values and service habits of their children, among other issues.

“For 40 years, VISTA members have been building the capacity of nonprofit organizations and combating poverty in one of the most intense, hands-on forms of service ever practiced in the United States,” said Corporation CEO David Eisner, who announced the study earlier this week at an event marking VISTA’s 40th anniversary at the national service conference in Kansas City. “We’re delighted to be launching a deep, impartial and highly scientific study to gauge the impact VISTA has had on long-term civic engagement in our nation.”

Since VISTA’s creation in 1964 as part of President Johnson’s War on Poverty, than 140,000 adults have worked as VISTA volunteers on projects to improve living conditions and advance economic development in low-income neighborhoods across the United States. VISTA volunteers serve full time in nonprofit organizations, public agencies, and faith-based groups, working to fight illiteracy, improve health services, create businesses, increase housing opportunities, and bridge the digital divide.

The study of the long-term impacts of the VISTA program will be conducted by Abt Associates, in collaboration with the Corporation for National and Community Service, the federal agency that has overseen the VISTA program since 1993. Working with Corporation staff as well as with various distinguished leaders in the field of social science research, Abt has developed a research design similar to the one used in a highly regarded study of Freedom Summer civil rights volunteers.

The new study will compare the behavior and attitudes of 1,170 VISTA volunteers who served during the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s to a comparison group who enrolled in VISTA during the same time period and completed the VISTA orientation but who did not actually serve in the program. (Using a comparison group of such similarly motivated individuals was intended to enhance the study’s ability to identify true program effects.) The study will consist of in-depth interviews along with a detailed questionnaire.

To date, VISTA has conducted little research on the long-term impact of the program on those who served. With this study, the Corporation has an opportunity not only to conduct a systematic analysis of the VISTA experience, but also to contribute an important work to the emerging literature on the long-term effects of civic engagement.

VISTA today is part of AmeriCorps, a network of national and community service programs that in 2004 will support the engagement of 75,000 Americans in intensive service to meet critical needs in education, the environment, public safety, homeland security, and other areas. In 2004, approximately 6,600 AmeriCorps*VISTA members will serve in more than 1,200 local programs. Upon successful completion of their service, members receive either an education award of $4,725 to pay for college or to pay off student loans, or a cash stipend of $1,200.

AmeriCorps is administered by the Corporation for National and Community Service, which also administers Senior Corps and Learn and Serve America. Besides AmeriCorps*VISTA, AmeriCorps includes AmeriCorps*State and National, a network of hundreds of nonprofit organizations, public agencies, and faith-based groups meeting a variety of community needs, and AmeriCorps*NCCC, a team-based, residential program for men and women between the ages of 18 and 24. Together with USA Freedom Corps, the Corporation is working to foster a culture of citizenship, service, and responsibility and to help all Americans answer the President’s Call to Service. For more information, visit www.nationalservice.org.

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