Service Learning At Waite House

The experience I encountered during the service learning project was great. Throughout the weeks allocated for the service learning project, I tutored grade two and three pupils from three different schools under two agencies. The names of the agencies are Lion Catcher and MLK Community Center. This project gave me the opportunity to work with little kids for a long time. This provided me with the privilege to help and work with people who are enthusiastic about learning. Through my colleagues and me, we were able to achieve the goal of the service learning project. One of the goals is to work with minorities who needs help. This goal does not benefit our clients only but us also, it helped us organize and improve the way we think about supporting our client and managed good clinical judgment.

The Mississippi School for Mathematics and Science has been called the most diverse square mile in Mississippi. Before coming to MSMS I had never seen other children my age who were Asian, Indian, or any other race except for Caucasian and Mexican. I didn't have a chance to talk to other children about their cultures or beliefs until I came to MSMS. Being at MSMS gives me the opportunity to speak to one of the most diverse student bodies in Mississippi. I am able to listen to the different languages spoken by the children here such as Vietnamese, Korean, Hindi, and Spanish. I also get the chance to join cultural clubs established by the student body. Currently, I am a member of the Asian Student Association. The ASA meets monthly to discuss

- Reflect on, with the children, their own responses to diversity and how they would include and respect a new child that comes to the school. For example greeting them and how they would make them feel like they belong.

I am currently at a placement site, where there is not much diversity when it comes to race. Many of my students consider themselves white or non hispanic with the exception of seven students. Out of those seven, two identify as African American, three identify as hispanic and the other two identify with two or more races. Besides race, I have diversity amongst gender, socioeconomic status, learning styles, accommodations, and modifications. My classes are comprised of more females than males who come from a variety of socioeconomic backgrounds. Some of the students come from well off families with occupations such as pastors, educators, military personnel, business owners, and doctors while others come from farmers, grocery store workers, restaurant employees and construction workers. Though there is nothing wrong with the occupations of the parents, it is obvious that there is a difference between the

Before school started this year, I participated in the Common Ground program as a ground crew member. During the weeklong event, I had the opportunity to not only introduce the incoming freshmen to Fremont, but to each other as well. Each day consisted of various activities, led by myself, the other ground crew members, and the adult facilitators of the program. The activities included multiple small group discussions that were focused on breaking down stereotypes in order to make the Fremont community more tolerant, as well as games meant to allow for the freshmen to discuss issues such as gender, friendship, and ethnicity. My tasks varied from introducing students with common interests to each other to make sure everyone had someone to sit

Service Learning is learning through experience to gain sociological observation, concepts, and theories so I decide to do my service learning hours in one of the two high schools that is part of the Oceanside Unified School District. The name of the school is called El Camino High School. El Camino High School is a high school that is located at 400 Rancho Del Oro Drive in Oceanside, California. It has over 3,000 students currently attending. The school’s mascot is the “Wildcat” and their colors are gold and red. El Camino High School is a public school that is part of a system of free public education that is maintained at a public expense for the education of students who are part of that community or district. El Camino High School is a place is a public school where students are coming out of middle school and are

As mentioned before I volunteer at Peninsula Elementary’s SUN program. Many of the workers volunteer, while a small amount get paid. Whether volunteering on their free time or getting paid, the leaders at SUN school all value the same thing, equality. All of the students enrolled in this program speak english, however, a large percentage come from different cultures and backgrounds than their fellow classmates. For example, I have a student who’s great, great, great…. grandfather (she wasn't sure exactly what generation he was, but knew that he was from her maternal side of the family) was a president in Laos. On the other hand, one of my other students who transferred to a different class is from Mexico and remembers she and her mother sewing her clothing. While these are only two out of many students, it just goes to show that all come from different cultures and live different lifestyles, which is great! All who are involved with Peninsula Elementary’s SUN program are united in understanding that difference amongst one another is awesome and should, without a doubt, be accepted (Community Cultural Wealth).

While at employed at the Louisiana Methodist Children’s Home, I encountered children from various cultural context. The children were between the ages 12-17 with various religious beliefs, disabilities, sexual orientations, and economic status. In other words, not one child was the same as the others. As a result, I had to be open minded and careful not the generalize. As I worked with them, I learned to adopt a patient and understanding persona when interacting with them because of the different backgrounds. Because I was understanding and willing to learn about their experiences, regardless of the different backgrounds, the children felt comfortable enough to interact and relate to me. Because of the trust I had established with them, they

Coming from a mid-size predominately white institution in a small town in Indiana, I have been fortunate to gain some great experience working with students of all kinds. During my second year at Indiana State University, I found my passion to work heavily with college students; so I immediately got involved with the Office of Residential Life at ISU. It challenged, created room for growth as a professional, and the ability to work students that are different from myself. One thing that challenged me the most is the different perspectives that my first year students brought to my floor community, although it may have not been pleasant one-hundred percent of the time, but it open of doors to build healthy, long-lasting relationship, not only

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.

Throughout my career I have dealt with a very diverse population of individuals. In the beginning of my exposure to the helping profession I have participated in direct service work with an eclectic adolescent population. I lived and worked with a group of young women that came from a variety of socioeconomic and racial backgrounds. From there I moved on to service work through a local department of social services. At that time I was involved with case planning and management with families who had their children placed in foster care or whose children were at imminent risk of placement outside of the home. As I look back I realized that the population I dealt with during that time period was actually less diverse than the teen population

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

Not until my summer spent at North Carolina’s Governor’s School did I truly experience diversity in a student population. Growing up in Lincoln County, with a modest population of approximately 10,000, left me with the opportunity of meeting people who knew exactly who I was, who my parents were, whose class I was in, and were almost exactly like me. Furthermore, being exposed to this type of people never allowed me to hear new ideas in person, as I only heard what beliefs had been passed down from generation to generation. However, my Governor’s School experience lead me to meet so many new people my age who came from all different walks of life. It completely opened up my perspectives and convictions to how I approach people, carry myself,

For my Community Service Learning placement, I am volunteering for PAAL, which is a program for children and youth with physical and intellectual impairments. Their vision is to offer individuals who otherwise may not get the chance, an opportunity to participate in a wide variety of physical activities.

According to Kathleen Flecky and Lynn Gitlow, service-learning is defined as, “learning that occurs in experiences, reflection, and civic engagement” (Flecky & Gitlow, 2011). In recent years more universities are implementing service learning into their curriculum. A key concept of service learning is civic responsibility. Civic responsibility can simply be defined as your responsibilities as a citizen. As will be shown later in this paper, service learning can have many benefits not only to a student, but also to the community members