Community service

Court ordered service[edit]
See also: Penal labor in the United States

Community service work detail for 35th District Court, Northville, Michigan
People convicted of a crime may be required to perform community service or to work for agencies in the sentencing jurisdiction either entirely or partially as a substitution of other judicial remedies and sanctions, such as incarceration or fines. For instance, a fine may be reduced in exchange for a prescribed number of hours of community service. The court may allow the defendant to choose their community service, which must then be documented by "credible agencies", such as non-profit organizations, or may mandate a specific service.
Sometimes the sentencing is specifically targeted to the defendant's crime, for example, a litterer may have to clean a park or roadside, or a drunk driver might appear before school groups to explain why drunk driving is a crime. Also, a sentence allowing for a broader choice may prohibit certain services that the offender would reasonably be expected to perform anyway.
Corporate social responsibility[edit]
Some employers involve their staff in some kind of community service programming, such as with the United Way of America. This may be completely voluntary or a condition of employment, or anything in between.
In addition, approximately 40% of Fortune 500 companies offer volunteer grant programs where companies provide monetary donations to nonprofit organizations in recognition of their employee's volunteerism (e.g. $500 volunteer grant after 25 hours of community service).^[15]
Worldwide examples[edit]
Community service in the United States is often similar to that in Canada. In Europe and Australia, community service is an option for many criminal sentences as an alternative to incarceration. In the United Kingdom, community service is now officially referred to by the Home Office as more straightforward compulsory unpaid work.^[16] Compulsory unpaid work includes up to 300 hours of activities, such as conservation work, cleaning up graffiti, or working with a charity. The Howard League for Penal Reform (the world's oldest prison reform organization) is a prominent advocate for increased community sentencing to reduce prison population and improve rehabilitation.
Starting in 2010, Danish high school students receive a special diploma if they complete at least 20 hours of voluntary work.^[17]
The International Baccalaureate program formerly required 50 hours of community service, together with a written reflection on the service performed, to fulfill the requirement of 150 hours of CAS (creativity, action, and service) and receive an IB Diploma.^[18]
Florence Nightingale exercised the entrepreneurship trait of nursing to help improve the unstable conditions of hospitals during the mid-1800s. Her tasks compiled of planning ahead at what needed to be different and how she was going to attempt to change things for the better, acting upon the ideas she came up with, and finally leaving behind a notebook of ideas and recommendations to help the next generation prevent the same disaster of extremely high death rates from happening again. Not only did she organize fundraisers to raise money for the hospital and arrange more stable living conditions to improve the health of the soldiers in the hospital, but she also removed people who were lapsed at their job and delegated tasks to more capable people, sometimes having to do the work herself. She grew up with the desire to help people or anything that needed a hand. Her love for aid and service to others grew when she got older and despite her lack of support from her family she pursued her dream and sacrificed her life for other people. She was not afraid to do the hard things if she knew it was going to make things better or as Niccolò Machiavelli puts it, "[T]here is nothing more difficult to carry out, nor more doubtful of success, nor more dangerous to handle, than to initiate a new order of things…"^[19] Florence Nightingale is wrote, "The first thought I can remember, and the last was nursing work." She served a specific group of people and benefited the public—which is community service.