University of Southern Maine Service-Learning & Volunteering

The Office of Service-Learning & Volunteering at USM works on several annual and smaller semester initiatives throughout the academic year to engage students and promote civic engagement as a positive method for supporting personal and professional growth.

Our annual Husky Day of Service, one of our biggest events of the year, brings together around 300 members of the USM community and disperses them through to 30 community partners in the greater Portland area for a day of service that meets partner needs, providing over 800 hours of volunteer hours in a day. On-going semester opportunities like STEM Ambassadors, which trains over 30 student volunteers to engage and teach elementary students how to have fun with STEM and learn about concepts in an experiential way, servicing over 400 hours. Our office crew also provide support for courses that incorporate a Service-Learning component in their curriculum, where students work on projects that serve the community while gaining knowledge and learning experiences that support their academics. We currently have approximately 100+ courses at USM where around 1000 students serve over 15,000 hours as part of their Service-Learning courses. All of these projects coincide with working with our community partners to provide students with community engagement opportunities outside of class and internships as a pedagogical approach to integrate academic learning with meaningful experiences in the community.