When I first registered for 268-Christian Social Teaching, I did not know what to expect. My assumption was the class would be an educational religion course requiring a lot of community service hours, which I would be struggling to complete. To my amazement, this course opened my eyes and mind to the realities of our world, not only inside the classroom, but also outside the classroom. Prior to participating in this course, I knew a number of people in my community were struggling financially, but I didn’t grasp the full extent of what they went through. However, through this course, I was able to interact with people who weren’t able to do, what I would consider, normal day-to-day activities, such as providing a meal for their family. Through …show more content…
As I previously mentioned, before starting the service-learning hours, I had no idea how I was going to find time in my schedule to fit in 20 hours of service. I am a pre-dental student majoring in biology and when I am not in class I am studying, researching in the lab, or doing homework until I fall asleep at night. Therefore, before starting the service learning hours, I would have preferred to learn about the course strictly in a classroom. However, I learned so much more going to Loaves and Fishes than I ever could have learned in a classroom. For example, one time while volunteering at Loaves and Fishes, I was talking with a client and she told me how this was her first time at our grocery store. She began to tell me how she had just moved to the United States due to a war in her home country where she had lost eight of her children. This made me take a step back and ponder. One of the biggest tragedies in the world is to lose a child, but eight children, I couldn’t even fathom the pain that she and her family must be going through. The woman then told me that coming to our facility is one of the best parts of her day because she’s around so many generous people that sincerely care and want to help her get back on her feet. Experiences like these truly enhanced my learning experience of Christian values and made me realize …show more content…
Surprisingly, as I was conversing with other people my age, I realized many of them were not registered to vote. Once I found this out, I felt as if it was my duty to let them know how easy it is to get registered to vote and how important it is to have a “voice” in the upcoming presidential election. I started assisting people by guiding them through the process of getting registered to vote, however, I found a surprisingly high number of citizens had no interest in becoming registered. When I casually asked them why they did not want to register, they all responded similarly, saying, “No one good is running for president this year.” My thoughts were, if they don’t believe anyone decent is running, at least register to vote to choose which candidate is the better of, “the bad choices.” Therefore, my advice to these individuals was to register to vote anyways. Registering to vote does not require them to vote in the upcoming election, but they will at least have a choice of whether or not they want to vote when the time comes. Moreover, what surprised me the most was how easy the registration process is. The registration process doesn’t take more than two minutes and it can all be completed online. Aside from registering people to vote on campus, I was able to send out Facebook messages to countless numbers of people telling them about
...adults compared to older adults were less likely to respond that voting was extremely important for good citizenship (133). He concludes that it is too late for the generation of young adults that do not feel voting is an important civic responsibility, however, that it is not too late to convince them that politics matter by showing them that they are giving their opportunity to make important decisions that may impact their lives to others who have different ideas. One may agree with Wattenberg’s idea that habits follow people throughout their lives instead of changing as they cycle in life. His personal accounts are an impactful way to illustrate the importance of building a sense of duty at a young age and carrying that responsibility throughout one’s life.
It is our civic right and duty to actively participate in governmental affairs. This recent election really highlighted the divide in opinion regarding the importance of governmental participation. “To many, our democratic system seems so broken that they have simply lost faith that their participation could really matter,” West writes in his essay entitled The Deep Democratic Tradition in America. Young people feel unimportant and irrelevant, which explains the lack in turnout from young voters ages 18-29. However, it wasn’t just young voters that didn’t turnout. Millions of eligible voters didn’t show up for the 2016 elections. A democracy without active participants is a democracy bound for
The Chartist movement (a working class political movement) in 1840 believed “People had no one else but themselves to blame for the actions of their politicians” (Nash). What Mr. Nash and the chartist movement believe couldn’t be more on the spot. This country has gotten to the point where people find it hard to walk down their street to the elementary school where the voting polls are, and take a few minutes to cast a vote. A vote that millions of people around the world wish they were able to have them selves. With all the political suffrage that goes on through the world and people forced to love a leader, these no-shows should be thankful to live in a democracy. A place where elections aren’t rigged and the people are truly heard. This is why the topic of voting turnout needs to be raised. Also it’s very annoying to hear people complaining about our President when they did not even vote. It’s a very bad habit to not vote, and it needs to change with the younger citizens of this country. Helping younger people see the importance of voting needs to start with technological and educational ideas while expanding all the way to social event ideas. Only then will America’s ability to find answers to voting turnout increase.
Political inactivity on the part of young Americans stems from one fundamental source -- a general cynicism of the American political process. This disdain for politics is further perpetuated by a lack of voter education and a needlessly archaic voting procedure that creates barriers to voting where they need not exist. While many of these existing problems can be rectified with relative ease through the implementation of programs such as Internet voting and better voter education, such programs create only a partial solution.
As a human services professional, there are many skills that you must already have and that you must obtain as you grow in your career. According to nationalhumanservices.org human services is a very unique feild to work in. They defined this position as the, “objective of meeting human needs through an interdisciplinary knowledge base, focusing on prevention as well as remediation of problems, and maintaining a commitment to improving the overall quality of life of service populations” . In other words, preventing conflicts and improving the lives of many different individuals using knowledge.
...eople not voting! Americans are becoming less educated on the issues that they are facing as well as the candidates running at the time of office. However, according Longley (2011) ”Still, 93 percent of infrequent voters agreed that voting is an important part of being a good citizen and 81 percent of nonvoters agreed it is an important way to voice their opinions on issues that affect their families and communities” (pg. 1).
Today in America, less than half of young voters between the ages of 18 and 24 vote (TheBestColleges.org). What most of these new adults fail to realize, is that their government depends on them to vote and elect new leaders to represent their country. Many of them make excuses to avoid voting, when really, they benefit most from voting.
Voter turnout has been declining in the United States throughout history through the potential voters’ personal choice not to vote and ineligibility. According to research a large percentage of individuals are not voting because political parties fail to appeal to the voters and this leads to the voting population losing interest in the campaign, while others postpone registering and by the time they realize their delay the election is upon them.
The decline in voter participation consider by many scholars to start shortly after World War II, however between the years of 1960-1974 American voters started to lose trust of the national government. Ahead only of Italy in 1974 (Powell, 1986, p. 18) and dropped just below 10% up until 1980. However, trust was the least important of the four attitude variables (Powell, 1986, pp. 18-19). So the challenge is how best do we get better voter turnout not just solely when we elect a new President, but during the mid-term elections as well. Many Representatives (Democrats) would argue that our laws on registration are too strict and limit turnout of elderly, poor and minority voters. Party competition to mobilize lower class voters, for example
A service learning experience is designed to enhance a student 's growth in personal and social development and to obtain an understanding of community involvement. For my service learning experience, I volunteered at Change Point Center. In this reflection paper, I will discuss in depth information about the services that Change Point provides, my goals while I was there,and what I ultimately learned from this experience.
Although there are 44 million eligible young voters ages 18-29, in 2012 only 45% of them voted. These young people make up one fifth, or 21%, of the eligible voting population, yet they often do not vote. Voting is a tremendous gift. Young people in many other countries around the world have to fight to gain this right. In America, voting is often taken for granted by all age groups, but the youth take it for granted the most. In this paper, the reason why young people do not vote will be explored and solutions as to how to get them to vote will be proposed.
Each school, because of government mandate, has to provide services for exceptional students. The textbook Human Diversity in Education defines exceptional students as “those eligible for special educational services” (Cushner, McClelland & Safford, 2011). There are several categories for exceptional student but they all fall under the Ability/Disability continuum. Some of the categories for exceptional students are the: intellectually gifted, specific learning disability, emotionally handicapped, hearing impaired, visually impaired, mentally handicapped, and physically handicapped. In this paper the specific type of students that will be discussed, fall under the disabled side of the continuum. As one can see from the list above there are various types of disabilities that can affect students. One of the disabilities that affect many students in schools today is known as the Learning Disability (LD). Students with learning disabilities, also known as specific learning disabilities, tend to be of at least average intelligence. Of at least average intelligence is the key phrase. A learning disability is defined as “a neurological disorder that affects the brain’s ability to receive, process, store, and respond to information” (National Center for Learning Disabilities,). Learning disabilities can affect students in the areas of listening, speaking, reading, writing and spelling, reasoning, and mathematics. A student that has a learning disability can at times suffer for a social anxiety. Though social anxiety can be something minor, for students with this disability 2011it can cause major problems. Their social anxiety is caused by fearing that they will not fit in because they are unable to understand or process the information a...
Many people think of the 206 million eligible voters in the United States and think, “How could one vote possibly make a difference?” Or perhaps some find themselves too busy, while other non-voters are simply uninterested in politics. With a combination of all excuses, about 75 million people that were eligible to vote in the 2008 presidential election chose not to. That’s 75 million unheard voices! 75 million unrepresented individuals make up approximately 36% of all eligible voters. That number of people could easily change the outcome of an election. When put in perspective and fully understood, it’s realized just how important it is for every eligible voter to vote, and do so responsibly. The significance of voting is commonly misunderstood. Voting determines things from the president of the United States, to a small town mayor, to representatives, which all in turn determine everything from war, to taxes, to a child’s education. This country was politically formed into something previously unknown to the world, and with citizenship to this great country and democracy, comes great responsibility. It is a right as U.S. citizens to choose to vote or not; however, it is a duty and obligation to do so, for the sake of those who have fought, for friends and family, and for this country as a whole.