Personal Narrative: How One Service Project Has Changed My High School Experience

For the last 17 years my father has worked with nonprofits to bring education to refugee camps in the most forgotten places on earth. He goes where the most basic services that we take for granted are lacking. All his efforts are made under the premise that education is the most liberating assistance of all. This early awareness of the abysmal inequalities that exist in the world has profoundly influenced my character and worldview. I carried out a variety of service activities in high school, all focused on helping leverage educational opportunities. My volunteer work allowed me to put my

In ninth grade, my mother suggested that I volunteer with peers at my high school who are special needs. She thought it would be good for me to meet other people my age who have their unique struggles in school, much like myself. I protested originally, but little did I know I would love volunteering with my peers, regardless of their disability. During this time, I signed up to volunteer with a local organization called Buddy Ball. At Buddy Ball, I had the opportunity to teach children with disabilities ages five through twenty-one baseball. When I volunteered with my peers, I mainly saw high schoolers with severe autism, intellectual disabilities, and emotional disturbances, whereas with Buddy Ball most of the participants had severe autism, intellectual disability, muscular dystrophy, cerebral palsy, spina bifida, epilepsy, or a multiple of disabilities. Both of these experiences allowed me to gain knowledge of a variety of special

(Wilson & Musick, 2000) Volunteering at City Youth gave me the opportunity to invest in children’s lives, and hopefully, have a positive impact. This semester, we played games, laughed, ate, and shared about our days. My experience at City Youth Ministries was not “ a short-term artifact” (Astin, Sax, & Avalos, 1999). Hopefully, this service participation will enhance my opportunities for graduate schools (Astin, Sax, & Avalos, 1999). By volunteering at City Youth, I accepted the social responsibility that I have to the children of

During my time at Shullsburg High School I have participated in over 42 Pep Band sang the Star Spangled Banner over 100 times in the community and have participated in Volleyball, Band, and, Choir. I have also volunteered at Outdoor Education and also Mini Miner Olympics. I have been in regional and state CDE for Poultry. I have received a Band Letter, Band Certificate. A Choir Certificate and also got a 2nd Class A Vocal Jazz Ensemble. In Volleyball I received a Volleyball Pin, and a Bar. I also received a Captain's Pin and a Captain's Plaque. I have wanted to go into Elementary Education because I love working with kids and teaching them new things. I have Serviced Learned and helped out in numerous children activities. I went to Outdoor

Six years ago, my life was changed forever. It was the summer leading into the sixth grade, and my mom asked me if I would like to help at a summer camp for special needs people. Honestly, I knew that I would be working at this camp no matter what my answer might have been. As I anticipated the first day of the week long event, I grew anxious; I was frightened by the unknown. Even though I've lived with someone with disabilities my whole life, my ten year old mind had no clue what the campers themselves be like. Despite my fears, this short five day week was one I would never forget.

Being a student at Washington Community High School, I put forth my best effort to involve myself in academics, athletics, school clubs, and volunteer work. During my freshman year of high school, I committed myself towards music to a great extent. I performed in the marching band, the Jefferson and Wilmor Contemporary Music Project bands, the Symphonic Winds top concert band, and the pep band. In addition to music, I competed in several athletic activities, including cross country and track. Furthermore, I participated in a considerable amount of school-sponsored clubs such as the Student Council, the Freshman Executive Board, the Washington Leadership and Community Service Club, the Spanish Club, and the Mathletes Team. Throughout my

Sophomore year was extremely difficult for me. You know how most people go through a rough patch at some point in their life? Well, that was me all of Sophomore year, everything just seemed too big and scary to deal with, and so I basically put everything off. The guidance counselors always use to say when we were going into high school that we would need to stay on top of things before they started to pile up. I just thought that they were just being dramatic to try and scare us into doing our work, but they really weren’t. By the time I realized this, however, it was a little too late, and I was faced with two options; attend summer school to regain the credit that I had lost, or face my peers when school started up again and be two credits

The agency that I visited for my placement is called Positive Change Academy. This academy is located in Wilmington Delaware. Wilmington Delaware is a city where about 17,000 of its residents are living below the poverty level. Positive Change is an alternative school for children in 1st through 8th grade. Children are enrolled in this school usually due to behavioral issues. The goal is to equip the children with the appropriate resources to help reintegrate them all back into public, or private schooling systems. I had the pleasure of interviewing with Mr. Miller: Director of Education. Mr. Miller stated that he is basically the assistant principal at the school.

When my mom told me that a letter had to be written for me to be able to attend the LIFE Charter school in North Shore, I said I wanted to help. I feel that by me explaining, you may be able to understand better why I chose to switch. It may seem unusual that I chose to switch schools for my last year when I have been going to Richmond since I was four. Trust me, I understand this. I’ve been told enough times. There are a couple of main reasons as to why I wanted to switch from Richmond, to LIFE. When I have told them to you, maybe you will get a better idea of why this switch was something that I wanted to make happen.

These last few years have actually been the best years of my life. They were filled with success, new relationships, and happiness. My involvement at school and in my community had a major role in the above listed.

I have learned a lot from the service learning project, I think that I can be used in my classes in the future. I have learned a lot about looking at individual’s strengths and adapting the process to fit their needs instead of hoping that the individual will change. I think that I could still improve upon this for the future, because it can be such a complicated task to do. From watching how upfront Melissa was about her expectations for the project, I learned how I need to be in future group projects if I were going to be the leader. To become a high performing team, I need to say my own expectations from the start.

I am currently a student attending Grandville High School and am looking for my first job. Although I do not have actual work experience, I work well with people of all ages and have experience with organization and time management, skills I have learned from my 5 years of volunteering at the local library, helping with events such as carnivals, registering people for the summer reading program, and also promoting the library and its programs. This past school year, I have taken 3 honors classes, 1 A.P. class, 1 foreign language class, and participated in the school symphony orchestra. I worked hard to learn my material to keep up with the fast pace of my classes and finished the year with all A's. Outside of class, I play the piano and was

For the duration of time amidst graduation and resuming my education I chose to instead take the time to better myself by means of coping with the hand I’d been dealt. High school was discouraging to say the least. Academically I was a failure, which was frustrating for everyone concerned, since it wasn’t a question of my intelligence, but my lack of motivation. Fortunately, I had a large support system, without which I wouldn’t have graduated, however, this support system was unconventional, including my dad and most of the faculty at Golden High School, which left me somewhat isolated from my peers. I struggled relating to most of my fellow classmates on a deeper than superficial level, which left me with only a few genuine relationships

A life lesson that I have learned over the course of my high school years, is you need to choose wisely which crowd of people to hang around. I’ve learned that not everyone is your friend, even if they tell you they are. There are people out there who will claim to be your friend, and will stab you in the back when you least expect it.

For my service learning aspect of this course, I volunteered at Lawrence Catholic Academy. There I worked one-on-one with a fourth grade boy who was struggling in all of his subjects. His grades were not very high and he needed a lot of extra help. One reason as to why he wasn’t doing well in school was because he rarely ever did his homework and therefore he always fell behind in class. Another thing that I had found out just a couple of weeks ago is that he was very sick last year and he had to miss half a year of school. Since he wasn’t in school for half of the year, he didn’t learn the material that he needs to know and therefore he is even further behind compared to the rest of his peers. I would always try my best to help him understand