Impact
Many students who return from an alternative break experience consider it a life changing event. Alternative break alumni have reported changing their major, increasing their campus involvement, committing to continued community service, actively staying updated on social issues, and joining a service program post-graduation such as AmeriCorps, Peace Corps, or Teach for America. Many return to participate and lead alternative break programs throughout their time as students.
An impact analysis conducted in 2001 by Dr. Pushkala Raman and her Marketing Research Class at Florida State University in conjunction with Break Away revealed that there is overwhelming evidence to support the view that alternative breaks are "indeed contributing to the creating of active citizens." Some highlights of the study include the following:
• Participants show stronger intentions of voting after participation
• Research indicates that alternative break participants are inclined to increase the amount of time they dedicate to serving the community after an alternative break experience.
In 2002, Dr. Raman conducted another study measuring the satisfaction of nonprofit organizations that utilize alternative breakers. Her work produced the following insights:
• 100% of nonprofit organizations that responded and had hosted break groups agreed or strongly agreed that they benefited from the work done by alternative breakers. • 100% of the same nonprofit organizations were interested in hosting alternative break groups again in the future.
Read more about this topic: Alternative Break
Famous quotes containing the word impact:
“Conquest is the missionary of valour, and the hard impact of military virtues beats meanness out of the world.”
—Walter Bagehot (1826–1877)
“Too many existing classrooms for young children have this overriding goal: To get the children ready for first grade. This goal is unworthy. It is hurtful. This goal has had the most distorting impact on five-year-olds. It causes kindergartens to be merely the handmaidens of first grade.... Kindergarten teachers cannot look at their own children and plan for their present needs as five-year-olds.”
—James L. Hymes, Jr. (20th century)
“As in political revolutions, so in paradigm choice—there is no standard higher than the assent of the relevant community. To discover how scientific revolutions are effected, we shall therefore have to examine not only the impact of nature and of logic, but also the techniques of persuasive argumentation effective within the quite special groups that constitute the community of scientists.”
—Thomas S. Kuhn (b. 1922)