For generations of college students, having a campus job typically meant swiping meal cards, shelving library books, and staffing residence halls in shifts squeezed between classes and into the evenings.

Madison LoMedico’s campus job looked different. Three mornings a week, the SUNY Oneonta student went to an elementary school, where she worked with young students in one of the district’s highest-poverty schools. Some days she led reading groups or helped students catch up in math. Other days she floated around the classroom, helping children stay focused while teachers taught lessons. Sometimes she worked with the school counselor in small friendship groups for students struggling socially.

“It was one thing to learn all this stuff in school,” said LoMedico, who just graduated with a major in human development and family studies and a minor in educational psychology. “But it was an entirely other thing to actually be in the field.” 

Unlike many students pursuing education or social-service careers, LoMedico wasn’t volunteering or completing an unpaid internship. She was getting paid. LoMedico was part of the inaugural cohort of the Empire State Service Corps (E.S.S.C.), a growing SUNY initiative that pays students to perform community-based public service work connected to some of New York’s most pressing social needs: food insecurity, K-12 tutoring, peer mental health support, sustainability projects, and veterans outreach. In exchange for 300 hours of service during the academic year, students earn wages, professional experience, and, many say, gain a stronger sense of purpose in their larger civic environment. 

For LoMedico, the appeal was immediate. “I did want to get a job at school, but I was always stressed about how I was going to balance it all,” she said. “If I could really connect it to what I want to do one day, build my resume, build my skills — that’s something that I’d be really interested in, rather than just working in a store or something.” 

When the program launched in 2024, SUNY leaders hoped students would respond enthusiastically. Even they were surprised by how quickly demand exploded: More than 2,000 students applied for the first 500 positions. 

The model is deceptively simple but unusually ambitious: Instead of asking students to volunteer for free or cobble together unpaid internships, the program compensates them for meaningful service work tied to both workforce development and civic engagement. More than 40 percent of SUNY students are Pell-eligible, according to program leaders, meaning many come from lower-income households and need paid employment while attending school. 

"I did want to get a job at school, but I was always stressed about how I was going to balance it all.”

In practice, that means a student interested in counseling might work in peer mental health outreach. A future educator can tutor elementary school children. Students concerned about food insecurity can support campus food pantries or SNAP outreach efforts. Others help high school students complete their FAFSA applications or participate in environmental sustainability projects. 

“What we wanted to do was create these paid, meaningful opportunities that address community needs and also help support students in their career path,” said Jamie Frank, SUNY’s senior associate vice chancellor for policy implementation and access initiatives. 

Back in 2023, in SUNY Chancellor John King’s first State of the University Address, he introduced the goal that every SUNY undergraduate would have the opportunity for a high-quality internship or research experience before they graduate. Knowing there would be equity issues among students who cannot afford to work for free, he developed the concept behind the E.S.S.C. and received enthusiastic support from Governor Kathy Hochul. Just three years later, E.S.S.C. appears poised for a major expansion. Pending final state budget approval, SUNY officials expect the program to double in size for the 2026-2027 academic year, growing from approximately 500 students to more than 1,000 paid service positions statewide. 

The increase comes at a moment when educators, psychologists, and civic leaders are more vocally advocating for national or state-based service programs for young adults. Conversations about civic disengagement, loneliness, political polarization, and workforce preparedness have revived interest in structured public service opportunities as a way to strengthen both communities and democratic culture.

Across political and educational circles, there has been renewed conversation about whether structured public service should play a larger role in young adulthood. Advocates argue that civic participation can strengthen empathy, social trust, and democratic engagement while helping young people develop maturity and purpose with job experience.

E.S.S.C. offers a distinctly contemporary version of that idea: not compulsory national service, but a paid, practical, career-connected model that treats civic contribution as both economically necessary and personally transformative.

Chancellor King has repeatedly framed the program not simply as student employment but as a broader civic investment. "The Empire State Service Corps program empowers our students to take on civics and service opportunities that benefit all New Yorkers,” he said. “Communities throughout the state are enriched, and SUNY students receive real-world experience as they work to improve lives through this program.”

That dual emphasis — practical career preparation alongside civic purpose — may explain why E.S.S.C. has drawn attention from other states and higher education systems looking to replicate a version of the model. Program leaders say colleges around the country have already begun contacting SUNY for guidance about how to build similar initiatives. 

Part of the appeal is that the program addresses several problems at once. For students, it creates paid experiential learning. In this sense, it reflects a broader shift in how colleges are thinking about applied learning. Traditional internships often favor students who can afford to work for free. E.S.S.C. attempts to democratize access to career-connected experiences by embedding compensation directly into the structure.

For communities, it delivers labor and support to chronically under-resourced sectors like education, food assistance, and mental health. For universities, it strengthens retention and student engagement. And for the state, it builds a pipeline of graduates with direct experience in public-facing professions.

“What we wanted to do was create these paid, meaningful opportunities that address community needs and also help support students in their career path."

At SUNY Canton, Associate Director of Career Services Katie Kennedy has watched the impact unfold at ground level since the program’s early rollout. Her campus started with just three students in the first year and expanded to nine in the second, with more expected next year. “We try to keep our students on campus to support places like our food pantry and our different programs that require student success mentoring and support,” Kennedy said. 

Students at SUNY Canton have served in food insecurity programs (SNAP/basic needs), peer mental health outreach, FAFSA completion assistance, sustainability initiatives, and student success coaching cohorts. One student helped coordinate wellness programming focused on nutrition, fitness, mindfulness, and journaling. Another worked with Renewal House, a community organization supporting survivors of domestic violence and sexual assault. Kennedy said the student ultimately received an Excellence in Service Above and Beyond award after exceeding her required hours because she became so invested in the work. 

“She really came to be connected with this site, and it really meant a lot to her,” Kennedy said. “As a major in forensic criminology, this is helping her achieve her career goals and develop the durable, transferable skills she needs to be successful when she graduates.” 

That idea of durable skills surfaces frequently in conversations about E.S.S.C. Students are not only gaining technical experience in fields they may eventually enter professionally; they are learning communication, teamwork, resilience, problem solving, and relationship building. 

That distinction matters deeply to students like Madison LoMedico. Before joining E.S.S.C., she assumed she wanted to become a classroom teacher. Through two years of direct school-based work, however, she discovered something more nuanced about herself. She loved working with children but preferred relationship-centered youth services over managing an academic classroom full-time. Now she hopes to pursue broader youth-service work through agencies and community organizations. This summer, she will continue through the Empire State Summer Service Corps at the Northern Westchester Y.M.C.A. 

The ability to experiment professionally while earning income is one reason students describe the experience less as volunteering and more as an integrated educational pathway.

“The program let me kind of put my feet in the water a bit, see what I wanted to do,” LoMedico said. “It was my favorite part of college, honestly. I’m so thankful for the program.” 

Across SUNY’s 64 campuses, students work in a strikingly wide range of service categories. SUNY officials said the categories themselves evolved directly from community demand. The first year focused heavily on K-12 tutoring, food insecurity, sustainability, and mental health support. But after requests from local organizations and school districts, the program expanded to include early childhood education and veterans outreach. 

Future plans include specialized literacy training grounded in the science of reading, as well as citizen preparedness and disaster response training that could help mobilize students during emergencies. 

LoMedico is aware of the dual purpose — paycheck and civic service — when speaking with her fellow students working in the program. “They feel like they’re making a difference,” she said. The structure also intentionally fosters a cross-campus civic identity — of belonging in something larger than themselves. Students participate in statewide summits, monthly meetings, and cohort gatherings where they exchange experiences across disciplines and regions. 

LoMedico remembers meeting peers from other SUNY schools and discovering how differently each service placement operated. “Even though it’s this one big umbrella term, we were all doing such different things,” she said. 

That collective identity matters to program leaders, who emphasize that E.S.S.C. is designed not as isolated volunteer projects but as a coordinated civic corps. E.S.S.C. operates in partnership with AmeriCorps, allowing eligible students to receive education awards they can apply toward tuition, supplies, or student loans after completing their service. But SUNY intentionally structured the program to remain more inclusive than federal AmeriCorps eligibility requirements alone, ensuring undocumented and international students attending SUNY can still participate. 

That emphasis on accessibility has become especially important amid broader national uncertainty around public service funding. Program leaders note that E.S.S.C.’s mixed funding model — combining state support with AmeriCorps partnerships — insulated it somewhat from federal disruptions that affected other service organizations. 

Senior Associate Vice Chancellor Frank, herself a former AmeriCorps participant, said those experiences can permanently shape students’ trajectories. “We always talk about students getting the service bug,” she said. “It never really goes away.” 

Meanwhile, public enthusiasm for the program appears to be growing. SUNY officials reported that legislators regularly attend service events, especially around food insecurity initiatives. One statewide “Day of Hunger Action” mobilized E.S.S.C. students to participate in campus food pantry work and SNAP outreach. During the program’s first year, students collectively logged more than 102,000 service hours and served over 74,000 New Yorkers. 

For students, though, the impact often feels more personal than statistics suggest. LoMedico, working in the Oneonta elementary school, worked to build comfort and acceptance with a shy second-grade girl who needed support services. At first, the child barely spoke to her. LoMedico tried gentle conversation while helping with classwork, reading groups, and one-on-one academic support. Slowly, over weeks and months, the girl began opening up. In LoMedico’s second year in the school, even though she was no longer assigned to the same classroom, the young girl still ran up to hug her in the hallway, eager to share stories about her day.

“That really stuck with me,” LoMedico said. “Seeing how students progress and how just being that one person in someone’s life can really help them — not even just academically but socially.” 

Multiply that impact by 500 employed students, she said, each of these past two years, and it’s encouraging to imagine the impact of E.S.S.C. across multiple categories of public engagement and personal fulfillment.  

In an era increasingly defined by anxiety about disconnection, programs like E.S.S.C. are betting that purpose and engagement can still be taught — not through lectures but through participation. And that when given the chance to contribute meaningfully — and be paid fairly for it — many students will prove to be more service-minded than adults might assume.