In recent months, a requirement that would be placed upon the students of this state has been discussed by the legislature. While this requirement would have some positive effects on some public works, and perhaps even the cleanliness of the towns of this great state, the negative effects on those whom it would be placed far outweigh the aforementioned positive effects. A mandatory community service requirement of 10-15 hours per week would not be beneficial because it would result in an increased level of exhaustion in students, a general drop in grades state-wide, and it would contribute to general discontent in the student population. A requirement of 10-15 hours of service per week would result in physical exhaustion. The busy schedule of a full-time student does not allow for a time in the week to complete such a large amount of service. Students are already subjected to seven hours of required school attendance–more with some schools–plus several hours of homework per night, and that does not even count some required after-school events. This already cluttered schedule does not allow for the students of this state to have enough time to complete their minimum of 10 hours of community service a week. At least not without cutting into their sleep schedule–which carries a host of problems in and of itself. Another area that would be effected would be student performance. If 10 hours a week are effectively stolen from students, they will lack time to complete their assignment and so run a serious chance of rushing their work. Several of the local schools already require their students to sacrifice their time to school-related activities, and I can say from experience that the last thing any student needs in more stres... ... middle of paper ... ...r own interests–that is, they would lack a time to come into who they actually are. The driving force behind everyone are their interests, without them people are empty shells, automatons of the lowest nature. When a person has his interests, he is motivated, he is fascinated by some aspect of the world around him; he has a true reason for motivation. Take the time to indulge these interests away from people, and there will be a drop in motivation. The point is this: adding this requirement to the already packed schedules of modern-day students would be remarkably detrimental to the lives of the students. While there would be some students who would thrive under that kind of pressure, the majority would not do so. The majority would see this requirement as just another annoyance, while the lack of time caused by it eats away the their personal development.
Lastly, graduation is a big part of anyone’s life, and disallowing it can be devastating, especially for a very small problem. If a student works countless hours getting straight A’s every year, they should not be denied graduation because they didn’t work service hours at their local laundromat. Forcing community service hours is completely redefining what graduation is, since it used to be that the student excelled enough in each subject to get the passing grades, which isn’t the case when students are concurrently forced to do worthless
One way to ensure a civically engaged population is to nurture and promote amongst youth and teenagers the value of participating in one’s community, with the hope that involvement will continue into adulthood. Most school districts in Arizona do not require students to volunteer as a graduation requirement. Those that do, necessitate a number of hours to be completed and logged individually; for example, Deer Valley Unified School District in Maricopa County requires eight hours of volunteering during a student’s senior year. Of course any opportunity for one to help society should be applauded – however, this particular process negates cooperative long-term attachment to a beneficial project and does not incorporate knowledge learned in class, or apply meaning in a real-life context. The implementation of Service-learning programs into public school curriculum would uphold useful skills associated with community involvement and citizenship, as well as address problems in real settings rather than do repetitious tasks in seclusion.
Within humanity people tend to motivate themselves by the effect it will have on themselves or the people that they genuinely care for. In the novel, The Road by Cormac McCarthy the man and boy
This school should not require 100 hours of community service as a graduation requirement because of the busy lives of teenagers, the pressure of graduation, and loss of enthusiasm for community service. Schools should encourage community service but this is not the way to do it.
Many different motivation theories have been created and dissected over the past century in an attempt to understand human behaviour and answer the question: “what creates the force needed to do things we want to do?”
Imagine a typical teen, they have a job, homework, sports, and other extracurriculars. They don’t get home till late at night and they are exhausted. This teen can take much more and thankfully they are about to graduate, but wait the school wants them to fit in one hundred of community service into that schedule in order to graduate. How on earth is this busey teen suppose to do that with all that they have going on? Students should not have to do one hundred hours of community service to graduate high school.
If human beings were never motivated in any way, our world would be nothing compared to what it is today. People have every right to wake up every single morning looking forward to how they are going to spend their day. The atmosphere they will be put in and faced with is very important, but the people who will be surrounding them are even more significant.
Community service is a common service for people to take care of each other and volunteer. People apply to different community services: soup kitchen, taking care of children and homeless people, clinics, churches, schools, neighbor's house and many countless places to volunteer. Some people really enjoy to work at community services while others do not. These community services can be a punishment for criminals because a court assigns them to do so. However, some people do not agree with community service supporters. While some people believe that there should be a community service requirement for high school and college graduation because students need to learn and have experiences there, they are right; on the other hand, a community service requirement should be allowed for two reasons and not be allowed for another three reasons.
Well, that depends who you're talking to. Slip the word "mandatory" behind community service, as school districts in Maryland, Washington, D.C., and hundreds of others have done, and "opportunity" takes a new twist. Opportunity for who? For the students, or for the communities that can now capitalize on students' free labor? (Martin, pg. 13)
Community Service is a service that is performed for the benefit of the public or its institutions. There are two groups who perform community service, and those are criminals and the rest of us. This means that, for the majority of us, performing community service is completely voluntary. It is for this reasons li that I believe that community service should not be mandatory in high school for graduation. The supporters of this act think of it as an ideal society’s noble concept, but it is rather a noble concept trying to force an ideal society. When you look at it from this perspective you realize it is ironic.
According to Mandatory Volunteerism by Arthur Stukas, Mark Snyder, and E. Gil Clary, it is very important not to force teenagers into community service. Since studies found that community service requirements can have negative effects on “students’ intention to volunteer freely in the future” it is important for these programs to be crafted better. For example, it was suggested that these programs should contain an “element of free choice and offer programs that allow students to choose the type of volunteer activity they will engage in.” This is extremely important since it will help students enjoy their experience doing community service and help “students who initially did not what to volunteer” find that they actually enjoy helping others “if the requirements were applied gently.”
Though, the concept of community service is not very new its importance has developed in the past few years. There are thousands of organizations all over the world that engage and hold millions of young people all through the world. People of all age groups, with a maximum number of youth are involved in the process of community service. Community-based organizations include; social service organizations, non-profit providers and associations that engage both young people as well adults as volunteers. The process is beneficial both for the individuals as well as the society. Without community service people would not know the meaning of charity and giving back. Community service can be defined as a service that is performed for the benefit of the public. Community service is not a responsibly or an obligation; it is a commitment. A person must want to do it with good intentions and not because they are being forced to do so. Basically, community service is a way for a person to give back to a community in which they live.
In an article written by Linda Saslow titled High School Mandating Community Service for Graduation, she mentions the many pros to mandatory community service. Saslow mentions school districts like Roslyn and Hewlett-Woodmere (1994, para 3) that have started requiring high school students to complete a certain number of community service hours in order to graduate high school. Their goal is to give “kids the opportunity for new experiences” (Saslow, 1994, para 4). Through research conducted by the school districts, they have come to the conclusion that students who would’ve been “too shy to volunteer have admitted that they were glad they had been forced”. This is good because it’s bringing students together and really opening them up to new
Osman, Rachel. "Should class attendance be mandatory? Students, professors say no." USA Today College. 25 March 2012: Web. 11 Dec. 2013.
Volunteering: The great experience no one can afford to lose. Opposers say, mandatory community service can have several negative effects on students. “Community service hours are impressive additions to college applications and can provide a student with a great sense of accomplishment; however, the mandatory hours will have many negative consequences” (Cydney Hayes, 2012). Many students are barely even passing the regular school curriculum, and opposers believe that adding the additional load of mandatory service hours will discourage teens from even wanting to graduate. Also mandatory service is usually assigned by a court as punishment to delinquents. “In a small number of cases, community service is required by the court system as restitution for delinquent offenses” (Planty and Bozick, 2006).