An expanded national service program can help address these problems. National service programs such as AmeriCorps, YouthBuild, and conservation corps put young people to work on a variety of socially useful activities: tutoring children, building affordable housing, assisting with disaster response, maintaining public infrastructure, and restoring the environment. In return, they earn a modest living allowance and a small educational scholarship. By working together on shared, concrete endeavors, young people from different backgrounds can build trust with one another in a way that more abstract calls for mutual understanding cannot accomplish.
