Mandated Volunteer Work

[Trem054]

Due to a recent assignment in my English class have had to read a few articles on this subject and was wondering what some of you have to say about this.

For those who have n idea what I am talking about though, this is concerning the growing trend in American education facility's to require community service in order to graduate. Many times this can get complicated when copious amounts of homework, sports and other after school activities such as yearbook committee are entered into the equation. Also, it is not uncommon for kids to not really be doing much of anything helping to community and simply be filing papers for some company for no pay. The usual amount of hours required to graduate is anywhere between 75 (my school) to around 150.

My view is that it is a rather stupid idea, merely another pretty useless thing that "looks good on a college resume." The act itself is an oxymoron for god's sake.

[Der Übermensch]

haha... join the forum, and immediatly ask us to do your homework...

[The Stig]

I've never seen it required for graduation. Good for resumes and perhaps required for things like NHS and the like, but never for graduation.

[lfantwister]

mandated volunteer seems like sort of a contradiction...

[SoulSeekerz]

I do volunteer work, but only because I want to, not have to.

[Trem054]

I'm not asking to have my homework done, i turned in the paper today. I have ghosted these forums for a while and i thought this subject could turn into a interesting discussion, or a good time-wasting discussion at least.

Like i said, it is more of a new thing that is rising in popularity, some private schools have done it for awhile but now many more public schools are doing it. My school is the only in the area that I live that i know about to require it. We must have 75 by the end of senior year and at least 10 each year. Thankfully I got my ten hours this year from the football coaches just for helping clean up the stadium after games.

[The Stig]

Well, Private schools can do what they want. I still have serious doubts that public schools can force the issue on this, though.

[Trem054]

Whether or not the really can, they are, I know my school has been doing it for a long time now. I can't remember the amount of schools that require it, or at least a good estimate, though I'm going to go find that now * wanders off*

Okay, i found it, around 26% of school across the United States require community service in order to graduate.

[jaredong]

in canada at least, i remember for your 4 years of highschool you needed 40 hours of community service which could be done at any time. Public school too.

on one hand it was silly because some people didnt really want to do it. So forcing students to do volunteer work just doesnt make sense. Plus, there were a lot of ways to cop out (like doing the forty hour famine every year, which involved just bumming around and having fun for forty hours and then pigging out after that. Which i highly doubt happens in the third world).

However, one could argue that for people who are already interested in volunteering, this wouldnt be a big deal anyway. And for those are are not, 40 hours per student would just be a real boost to the community around. For a school with a 1000+++ students, those hours could be used for various charities and whatnot that would not normally have them.

Ya sure we're suppose to encourage voluntarism and voluntarily, but that'd be so much harder. 40 hours in 4 years isnt that tough anyway really.

Though, i know a lot of people who pick a lot of volunteer hours thinking "this would look good for college". On one hand its like "those bastards". on the other its like "least they're doing some good".

[SoulSeekerz]

Forced volunteer work=paid slave labor

[Chrizzle fo' Shizzle]

Well, Private schools can do what they want. I still have serious doubts that public schools can force the issue on this, though.

I had to do it to graduate. It wasn't that hard, as I had 4 years and only had to do 40 total hours

[EinzingerIsGod]

Yeah mandatory volunteer work is a contradiction.

By the way, I live like 10 mins from you (to TS)

[italic zero]

i've never even heard of salisbury except the steak

[Dr Hooch]

Sounds very... American.

Never heard of this in england although if you want to do medicine, bet scinece or nursing they won't look twice at you without some work experinece, and the easiest way to get that is volunteer work.

[lfantwister]

i worked in a hospital two years ago, and i didnt have work experience.

i wanted to be a doctor and then they put me in the gift shop

[PerpetualBurn]

Gift shop at a hospital? What's it sell, kidneys?

[ghostfacekillah]

i worked in a hospital two years ago, and i didnt have work experience.

i wanted to be a doctor and then they put me in the gift shop
i hope you really didn't expect to do any sort of medical tasks without any experience or knowledge...

[PerpetualBurn]

I'm quite sure she didn't expect to be performing heart surgery on the first day...

[lfantwister]

Gift shop at a hospital? What's it sell, kidneys?
I was expecting to wheel people around and such. But gift shop was cool. it mostly entertained sick peoples' grandkids and made for a lot of dusting

[Swill_Merchant]

Forced volunteer work=paid slave labor


I don't think so. I think mandatory volenteer work (even though an oxymoron) should be installed into the ciriculum. It would do good in community building, since volunteering is something rare for people to do for a noble reason. Even if kids are there for the wrong reason and moping around, at least someone is there doing something. And as far as picking up **** on the highway and parks, maybe it would help litering since picking it up sucks.
Anyways, all labor, according to the egyptians, is slave labor.

[Scuba_Steve]

they dont do it to "make the kids better member of society" they are doing it cause it gets charities and organizations buttloads of free labour when you need it to graduate.

[c0mpt0n4ss]

I had to do that for high school, as well. Chicago public students are all required to do 40 hours for graduation, which isn't nearly as much as it seems. They were very liberal with what constituted volunteer work. I got 30 hours for moving books during a freshman orientation, and spent half the time there playing lacrosse or planning when to booze with the other kids there. And if you think you're too busy with homework to fit it in, just do all your stuff during the summer.

[Trem054]

In some cases you can't do it over the summer. I'm sure there must be some other schools like mine, and here you can only do your hours between the start of school and May 15th.

Though the idea of getting kids to help around the area is a nice one, like scuba steve said, it often just turns into free labour for companies. My school has a builliten that tells you places to go and volunteer if you can't find anything and it is usually just stuff like unloading trucks for whatever buisness.

btw, Salisbury is mostly a little-*** town right on the beach, though I have heard that back in like to 60's or 70's the amusement park at the beach was extremely popular, like on a national scale, though that is probably an exaggeration.

[EinzingerIsGod]

btw, Salisbury is mostly a little-*** town right on the beach, though I have heard that back in like to 60's or 70's the amusement park at the beach was extremely popular, like on a national scale, though that is probably an exaggeration.

Salisbury isn't in good shape right now.

[GreyHam]

i do about 250-300 hours volunteer work a year

i actually volunteer for it though

im a king amongst men

[Swill_Merchant]

they dont do it to "make the kids better member of society" they are doing it cause it gets charities and organizations buttloads of free labour when you need it to graduate.

The point is that things are getting done where things need to get done. Anyways, not all people have the same attitude you do. Sure, some kids may sulk down and bitch about giving to the community, and helping people and being a good person; but some people may realize that this is actually a good thing to do even if it doesn't pay monitarily. I would have never thought about doing volunteer work until I was forced into it, and I am glad I was since it does help and in my opinion that it is just like homework.

Also, don't tell me that 40 hours stretched over 3 or 4 years of highschool is SO hard to do. Its really hard to take 10 out of the 8760 hours i have in the year to give charity, it can really tear the soul right out of a man

[Kaleid]

I would have never thought about doing volunteer work until I was forced into it, and I am glad I was since I do help
That's great, but perhaps some lazy people would resent the fact that it was forced so intensely that it would put them off ever volunteering themselves.
Is it really mandatory? Can you never graduate without it?

[HazMatBlue]

my current education schedule requires me to get community service to graduate, but thats just my special schedule and those who share it not the entire school.

i have no problem with that though, it'll just feel weird getting a form of "credit" for it

[CarnageFairy]

It was "required" at my school, but I forget how many hours.

Funny thing is I haven't done any actual community service during school since 8th grade, but every year I magically got more and more service hours on my report card until I had enough.

[Swill_Merchant]

That's great, but perhaps some lazy people would resent the fact that it was forced so intensely that it would put them off ever volunteering themselves.
Is it really mandatory? Can you never graduate without it?

Its not that different than going home and doing a project, or homework. If you choose not to do projects, or daily homework you won't get the credit and if you are bad enough, you will not graduate. This is just a 3 or 4 year project that you'll only have to spend a little bit of time on
(in the sense of 3 to 4 years). I understand there are some cases in which it would be inconvinient, and maybe annoying, but definatley not hard. You can make the argument that "I am in a FREE country and SHOULDN'T have to do this." Well then don't, no one is forcing you with rope and torture to do this. And since you aren't forced into graduating high school, it by default becomes an option, meaning that requirements can be set anyway the state wants to.

[Reaganista]

i had to do 5 hours

I answered phones during an NPR pledge drive it was awful sooo many british people called me