"In the Service of What?" By Kahne and Westheimer

Quotes

1) “Educators and legislators alike maintain that service learning can improve the community and invigorate the classroom, providing rich educational experiences for students at all levels of schooling.  Service learning makes students active participants in service learning projects that aim to respond to the needs of the community while furthering the academic goals of the students” (2).

Service learning does not just help the volunteer; it is also important to the person or group of people you are helping.  The service learning project that we are completing in class helps us learn how to become teachers and get a look at what we will be working with someday.  I work in an ESL classroom where most of the students speak Spanish.  You leave an impact while working with your students.  I enjoy returning to my classroom every week just to see the children and have them say “Hello Miss Pires!”.  Service learning is beneficial for everyone who is involved.

2) “Boyer endeavored to create ‘a new Carnegie unit,’ the requirement that all students take part in volunteer activities in either their school or community as a condition for graduation from high school” (5).

I agree with Boyer, I believe every high school should have a service learning requirement.  High schools should have a minimum of twenty hours for their service learning/community service requirement.  Kids today are egocentric, they only care about themselves.  A service learning requirement would help students become aware of the contributions they could come up with just to help people in need.  One could volunteer at a hospital, a nursing home, a soup kitchen, or an animal rescue center.  No matter the place, the feeling is always the same.  Emotions will become involved and you will become attached.  You can create happy memories just knowing that you can help someone in need. 

3) “A music director at a middle school we studied wanted her suburban, upper-middle class students to perform at a nearby elementary school in a poor neighborhood.  Some of the middle school parents objected, saying they were concerned for their child’s safety.  In a written evaluation, the students said that they had imagined ‘horrifying children running around on a dirty campus’”(7-8).

I find this to be very typical amongst the upper class.  They believe that because the school is in a poor and bad neighborhood that those students are delinquents and that they behave like animals.  Sadly, I was one of them before I began my placement.  I told my family what school I had been assigned to for my service learning and they told me it was not a great neighborhood and they were not too thrilled with my placement.  The students and I both learned that what we originally thought was just the complete opposite.  These are normal schools with regular children who are just trying to learn.  Our perspectives on schools in rough neighborhoods has changed.  Just like the old saying goes, “Never judge a book by its cover”.  How can dislike something or have a very strong opinion about it if you never experienced it yourself?

Delpit has stated that change is change and that it helps no matter what the cause.  Kahne and Westheimer believe that change is not enough.  Instead, we need to construct a plan of action and begin social reconstruction in order to actually solve problems in this world.

Here is a link that explains what service learning is and why it is important. Hope you enjoy!

Question:
Should service learning be a requirement in all high schools?