"In the Service of What?"

            When I realized that I would next be reading an article about service learning I knew that it would be best for me to do a reflection blog since our class is doing it. Reading "In the Service of What? The Politics of Service Learning" by Joseph Kahne and Joel Westheimer, has helped me remember how important our Service Learning Project is, not only because I am learning more about teaching but because I can help many kids learn when they need it. I personally have had a difficult time in my service learning placement and needed the reminder of why I am doing it and why I was excited for it in the first place.
            Service learning does not just have to be at an elementary school, middle school, or high school, it is meant for those to be tutored that need the help. I was sort of confused when Kahne and Westheimer gave their examples of service learning, which were helping out a center with babies that were carried while their mothers had done drugs during the pregnancy, giving homeless people survival kits, running errands for a busy doctor, etc. Don't get me wrong they all were great community service projects and they gave me good ideas for the future, but I thought in service learning projects, we the students are not supposed to be the only one going through a learning experience. In those examples, the students were definitely helping others and making their lives a bit easier, but did those that were helped by these students really learn as much as the students learned while helping someone in need? This is just something that I had to wonder since I am really hoping that the students I tutor will walk away having learned as much, or even more, from the experience of service learning as I have. But after reading this piece I realized that service learning is not a completely separate thing, it is a form of community service and volunteering.

             In the second part of Kahne and Westhemer's article, they talk about how requiring community service in high school, or in our case college, really helps with moral development. In high school I barely completed my requirement and did not understand why or how I was supposed to do twenty hours of community service in my last two years of school. Now that I'm in a sorority I have put so much time into our philanthropies such as raising money for breast cancer, cleaning a whole homeless shelter's kitchen, participating in save the bay, relay for life, doing adopt a family at Christmas time by giving presents to children that would not have had any otherwise, etc. I think that all of those experiences have had a huge part in me being who I am today and they have only made me want to help more; to help those organizations again, to do more community service, and to start helping other organizations as well.