Campus Outreach Opportunity League

The Campus Outreach Opportunity League (C.O.O.L.) was a United States national, non-profit organization founded to promote and support college student involvement in community service and social action. It was founded in 1984 by Wayne Meisel and Bobby Hackett. For twenty years COOL carried out a number of programs and strategies to fulfill its mission. COOL played a critical role in building the community service movement among college campuses throughout the United States. COOL worked with hundreds of colleges and universities to build, develop, and/or strengthen community service programs and service-learning efforts.

In addition, many of the individuals involved with COOL—particularly as staff—went on to play critical leadership roles throughout the national and community service movement. This movement or field was particularly boosted by federal policy to invest more in national and community service.

Throughout much of COOL's history, and due to a combination of factors, the organization frequently had difficulty securing sufficient financial resources. It faced near bankruptcy on a number of occasions. In 1994 the organization nearly ran out of funds. The entire national headquarters in Minneapolis, Minnesota was shut down approximately three weeks before the 1994 National Conference. A small group of conference staff based in Boston, continued to work through the conference. These were John Sarvey, Dawn Hutchison, Kim Lovelace, and Joel Jason Rodriguez. Ironically, the 1994 National Conference achieved the highest level of participation ever and ended with net revenues of $50,000.

As the board of directors of COOL weighed whether or not to close the organization in 1994. They decided to move it to Washington, DC. Youth Service America provided office space and some key administrative support. The board appointed one of its own members, Jennifer Bastress as executive director and charged her with rebuilding the organization.

Melissa Kendrick period
Ariane Hoy and Dawn Hutchison period
Ariana Hoy period

In 2004, the leadership of COOL entered agreed to have the organization be acquired by Action Without Borders/Idealist.org. Although it was characterized as a "merger," it was in fact, a full acquisition. Financially COOL had more debt than assets. It lived on as the Idealist On Campus program of Action Without Borders. In 2007, Action Without Borders decided to discontinue the program.