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Colleges and universities are placing a renewed emphasis on the importance of service and community engagement. Although the short‐term effects of these college experiences are fairly well understood, little is known about the long‐term impact of college volunteering and participating in engaged forms of learning (e.g. service‐learning). This longitudinal study examines 416 participants during their freshman year of college, their senior year, and 13 years after graduation. Results show that both college volunteering and service‐learning have positive, indirect effects on several forms of well‐being during adulthood, including personal growth, purpose in life, environmental mastery, and life satisfaction. Specifically, these college experiences are associated with subsequent behaviors (adult volunteering) and attitudes and values (prosocial orientation), which in turn are positively associated with well‐being. Implications for research and practice are discussed.

When the Gratz v. Bollinger and Grutter v. Bollinger lawsuits were filed, the University of Michigan needed to provide solid evidence for the educational benefits of diversity, because this was (and still is) a key legal rationale for considering race in college admissions (Chang, 2002a).1 Since that time, scholarly research on the student outcomes of college diversity experiences has flourished. Numerous studies have illustrated the generally positive effects of engaging with diversity through informal interactions with diverse

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