Learning by Serving Others

Long Beach Unified School District, the state’s third-largest school district, this week adopted a requirement that students complete 40 hours of community service for high school graduation.

District officials stress that Long Beach’s program, which will go into effect for the class of 2007, will be connected to classroom objectives or to a school’s extracurricular activities rather than simply tracking the time a student spends picking up trash.

Los Angeles, the state’s largest district, adopted a service learning requirement two years ago for the class of 2007 but did not specify a number of service hours.

“Linking the classroom with the real world of work -- this is one of the things we’re really trying to do,” said Long Beach’s Board of Education President Bobbie Smith. “Service learning strengthens the relationship between the school and the community [and] supports better grades, more interest in school, and fewer risky behaviors.”

Service projects, Long Beach officials said, could include high school students tutoring middle schoolers, helping to run blood drives, ushering for cultural events or building houses with Habitat for Humanity.

The school board passed the requirement unanimously. But parents are divided on the idea, said Camie Dean, an advisor on middle and high schools for the Parent Teacher Assn.

“I think it’s a great idea, but some of my friends are really against it,” Dean said. “My girls have done it at Millikan [High School] for years. It helps them see what the world is really like and it makes them better people too.”

Debbie Wall, however, says the policy will create an extra burden on single parents who already spend a lot of time chauffeuring their children from activity to activity. She also believes the 40-hour requirement does not consider those who are having a hard time in school.

“It’s fine for students who are already doing well, but some students are already working hard just to make it -- like my son,” Wall said. Her son Kevin, who suffers from attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, will be part of the first class required to complete service learning.

Kevin Wall and his classmate Michael Calderon at Stanford Middle School said completing community service while keeping up with regular schoolwork will stress them out.

“I get up between 6 and 7 a.m., do some homework, go to school, and then at the end of the day I’m burned out,” Kevin said. In the evening he does homework, eats dinner, plays computer games, then goes to sleep.

Plus, his friend Michael said, the requirement seems like punishment. “Picking up trash is something you have to do when you go to detention,” he said.

District officials said they will let high schools design their own programs after a steering committee sets guidelines. They intend to allow students who work after school or lack transportation to complete their service learning during the school day by doing things such as working on community surveys. They also insist that the program will not cost any additional money.

Ruth Weems, a 17-year-old senior at Wilson High School and student member of the Board of Education, said community service should not be seen as an exhausting burden or as punishment. “Forty hours over four years is not that much,” said Weems, who estimated that she has logged 240 hours of community service during high school.

“I think it’s a great idea for everyone, because it gives you communication skills and helps you learn how to deal with different situations that you’re not in every day,” she said. “The trick is to pick something you love to do, because there are many things you can do to touch someone else’s life.”

Los Angeles district officials also said they want students to think of their service projects as part of learning.

Laverne Potter, a service learning teacher advisor, pointed to a project in which San Fernando High School students work with local groups to research the ecological, cultural and architectural history of the Hansen Dam and create surveys for area residents. Potter said it helps students in history, language arts and writing.

Recent events have prompted education officials to consider the responsibility of schools to their communities, said Shirley Schwartz, director of special projects at the Council for the Great City Schools, a Washington, D.C.-based organization of urban schools.

“Since Sept. 11, there has been a renewed interest in civic responsibility, and this has probably spurred the interest in community service and service learning a lot,” Schwartz said. “There’s also the whole push by President Bush for citizen volunteers -- the Freedom Corps -- with the hook to homeland security.”

Every state except Wyoming, North Dakota and South Dakota has school districts that require community service or use service learning, said Amy Cohen, director of Learn and Serve America. That agency is part of the federal Corp. for National and Community Service. Maryland even has a statewide requirement.