Only 8 percent say that politics is the best way to make a difference for society, as compared to the 32 percent who named education or 22 percent for non-profit work.

The IOP found much the same thing in their April survey. Voluntarism among college students is high--around 60 percent--but only 17 percent chose to direct their energies to a governmental or issues-based organization, and a scant 7 percent joined a political campaign.

A stunning 64 percent say they do not trust the federal government to do the right thing most of the time.

"Where I teach," says Richard Zweigenhaft, a sociologist at Guilford College in Greensboro, N.C., "fewer and fewer students seem to think government is capable, or likely, to solve the kinds of problems they are most concerned about."

Perhaps this is not surprising, just months after the sordid conclusion of the Monica S. Lewinsky trial and the Elian Gonzalez circus. Washington is a little tattered around the edges right now, and students notice.

"One reason I didn't go into politics right away was because I didn't like some of the things that were happening in politics," says Byron J. McLain '00, outgoing chair of the IOP's Student Advisory Committee. Next year, McLain will be working as a management consultant at McKinsey & Co. in Atlanta, Ga.

C. J. Mahoney '00, McLain's vice chair, will also be taking a two-year McKinsey post. As with his classmate, the decades of debate characterizing federal politics as corrupt, inefficient or just plain evil has taken its toll.