Reflection About Service

I have served God and those in need. I am particularly proud of my involvement with Hephzibah Children Association. During the holidays, I had the chance to volunteer and visit children at Hephzibah Children Association. It was an amazing experience to fill their day with joy. I also devoted a great deal of my time at the Christmas Cheer Foundation. Every year, I volunteered and helped those in need. Furthermore, a duty of mine was to help wrap books and other supplies for children to have something to open on Christmas Day. Reflecting on my devotion to God and my personal growth, I realized when I was younger I thought I was doing this for fun. As I grew older, I realized I was bringing happiness to children on Christmas Day. I have found myself being challenged and learning to balance everything in my life. However, serving God, and the community is an area in my life where I can say has been less of a challenge, but more of a

Service is an extremely important part of my life. I believe that through service we are able to serve God. I’ve always been an active member of my parish, Our Lady of Lourdes. Lourdes serves as a family for me, and through this family, I’m blessed with opportunities that allow me to serve my Lord. In 2011, I began volunteering at Our Lady of Lourdes’ Sunday Meal for the Homeless. We provide dinner for local Homeless people in the area of Bethesda, Maryland. I started service here because, I needed service hours for my confirmation, but its become such a joy in my life to see these men and women every Sunday, and I continue to serve them even to this day. Another service opportunity Lourdes has provided me with is the ability to volunteer at

At church, in addition to my participation in the worship services, I volunteered at our church’s soup kitchen, medical camps and elementary school for underprivileged children. These experiences opened my eyes to the deprivation of love and care in the world and a dire need of God’s grace for people at large so they could receive forgiveness, healing and restoration in their lives.

I have been involved with several service activities throughout my life. Some of the more recent services that I have participated in include: Helping set up and helping teach underprivileged children at the Children's Defense Fund Freedom School. Here I volunteered my time during the summer helping set up the classrooms and supplies, moving and unpacking and organizing; supplies, food, and donations the summer program. I also helped out this summer program by checking people in and out, guiding and directing people where to go, and unload and load the children onto the busses. During the summer I also volunteered a week of my time to be a “buddy” to a special olympiad at their Special Olympics Athletic Retreat. Being a “buddy” included self regulation, chaperoning on field trips one on one, assisted with self care skills when they where needed. Also this summer I volunteered my time for four weeks being a counselor in training at the Stowe YMCA. This included reading to the campers, helping serve meals to the campers, Chaperoning on field trips with the campers and being camp counselors to campers in grades pre-k through fifth grade. I also have been participating on my temple’s youth group advisory board. There I help determine, plan, organize, and run group activities and social events for the youth groups. I have been doing this for the past three years. This group also partakes in several community service projects throughout the

Acts of service always created a desire in me to help make people’s lives better. People often put forth their best when

In this regard, the most important part of service to me personally is giving back to the community. Volunteering is my way of providing service to others, it is not only effective, but it’s a good way to meet people, to learn, and to develop social skills. By helping or supporting others, I learned and used new skills in communicating with people and I have gained confidence in myself through different interactions. Providing aid to a family in need or helping out an elementary teacher is necessary, because as people it should be our natural tendencies to support one another, and bring aid when aid is due. For example, at Seven Lakes High school I created the Girls for Krause Club. It was given the name the Girls for Krause club after the Krause Center; a center in Katy that fosters girls who have been taken out of their homes due to sexual harassment, parental mistreatment or mental issues. My first visit to the Krause Center was with my youth group at church. I was so touched by all the girls at the center, and how open they were about their situation. I remember one of the girls telling me thank you, for treating her like “a regular person.” This interaction gave me the incentive to create the Krause club, because I wanted to allow other girls my age to interact with these girls and bring attention to a center that wasn’t well known in my community. Moreover, creating the Krause club has been rewarding and a way to showcase

This past summer I participated in Camp Holy Cross where I donated my time ad counseled kids from eight to three each day. I worked in the field thus I had to set up games, instruct them and take care of the kids while they were there. Another event I participated in with my church was the soup kitchen. This is where members of the Church’s youth group get together and put on a dinner. I also participated in the crop walk. This is where we collect donations to fight hunger and then walk six miles around Dalton. Therefore my community service shows how I give back, and another reason why I should be

Because of this I am often given the opportunity to give back and to serve others. One of my favorite parts of serving others is spending time with people and forming unique relationships. I have served in many ways through my school such as through key club, through the softball mentoring program, through the J-Term community service, through being a writing tutor for the English department, and through helping at the middle school track meet. I am fortunate to belong to a church that emphasizes serving others. I have been involved in many service projects through our youth program.

I mainly did these volunteer service hours during my time in high school and some others in grade school that I can’t quite remember. For my first three years in high school each student had to get a certain amount of service hours. For all three years I chose Merrimac Park for the location I would choose. It was close to me and I went there often. My first year I simply walked around the park and picked up all the trash I spotted. The second year I did this but then I also asked if they would let me help in the park house as well. They said yes so whenever I came I would sweep the floors of both the hallways and the gym. The third year I was once again looking to do a little more so I offered my services as a score board operator for the youth flag football league I had once been a part of at the park. I knew the person in charge of the athletic programs at the park so he agreed. I was even allowed to ref a few games because I know the basic rules having been in the league and also playing football myself in high school. I think that year was my favorite out of the three. I loved cleaning the park but adding on the role to help out the flag football league was a blast. It was something that at the time I was passionate about and had a close tie with. To be able to help was truly an honor and made me glad I was able to volunteer my time at the

I knew what helping the community looked like especially since I had to do community service to graduate high school. Most of my community service house came from going on a mission trip with my church to a different state. When on this trip we would build a church for a week, but the people that went on this trip were all people that I knew. The only people I didn’t know were the people that we would stay with. Since I have been on these trips since I was about eight, I have been able to take on more responsibilities and become more of a leader on the job site to the younger kids. This has transitioned over to my sports and classroom here at Bridgewater. I have been able to become a better leader both on and off the field in sports and also to organize study sessions for

For my service learning hours, I decided to assistant coach at Four Corners Charter Upper School. When I took on this task, being tremendously excited to work with the girls there and give back to this school. My role consisted of being the assistant coach to my sister Amanda Ramirez, helping her to guide and train the girls to learn the sport of lacrosse. Having experience in coaching high school girl’s lacrosse, I came in with drills and strategies to be the most effective assistant coach. The girls that decided to come out for the team haven’t ever heard of the sport, which became a good thing for coaching, giving us the upper hand for coaching and teaching the sport to the girls.

I was a participant in the Labor of Love event on Saturday, September 9 from 8:00am-12:00pm. At 8:00am on Saturday, we all gathered on the McKenna Lawn for a brief meeting and continental breakfast. During that time, together as Setonians, one of the Sisters of Charity spoke to us about the importance of performing charitable works, and how these works will impact many people who are in need of our gift of service. After those impactful words, we were dismissed off to our service sights. I signed up for the Greater Parkview Church. I really did not know what to expect when I signed up for the service day, but I thought it would be a great opportunity to meet fellow students and serve at the same time. The church is located on the corner of Westminster Avenue. It is a large building that houses service every Sunday morning and a bible study every Wednesday night. When my friends and I walked into the doors, the pastor was sitting in his office. He immediately put us to work. We cleaned the inside and outside of the windows. Inside of the sanctuary space, we vacuumed, Lysol wiped the wooden pews and microphone stands. Also, we dusted the wooden fixtures on the altar and the surrounding area.

1). How do you believe service learning (SL) is utilized as a tool for fostering civic engagement?

In my freshman year, I went to a primary school to help the kids with their homework for 7 hours in total. I enjoyed the time I spent with them, since I felt happy when I saw them happy after figuring out the problems together. The most difficult part is that I had to earn their trusts first, so that they would be willing to ask me questions. But after I got familiar with them, the problem was solved, and we had wonderful time. I went there for two hours last year as well. In order to have diverse experience, I went somewhere else for the service and met different people. During my sophomore year, my host family introduced me to a person she knew, and I did house cleaning in her house for about 6 hours. From that experience, I learned what the lives of people in other neighborhood are like. In the second semester, I did my service in a bubble tea store for 8 hours. I knew the host there before, and I was willing to help him if he needed. I swept the floor and arranged some of the materials for him, and watched how he run his business. I did the rest part of the service in school when it has activities such as open house, for that I belong to the school community and I think I should help. Generally speaking, I enjoy these service inasmuch as they all enrich my personal experience in certain way and I feel satisfied when helping

When I volunteered at the Boys and Girls Club this summers, I could have gotten my hours in less than two weeks. However, I decided to work all day for over a month because I felt really good about helping the children. I enjoyed volunteering my time without being asked because I knew that I could help with the kids. I can also apply my witness of faith by how I treat those who may not have been kind to me. I respond the same way or take the high road. I always try to take the high road.