School Community Service Projects are Absolutely Dreadful

[Spartan 319]

        Hi guys, haven't been on here in a while. So I'm sure if you live in the United States at some point you may have been graded on what you contributed to the community for x number of hours. Seems like a pretty fair assignment, seeing as in my area nobody really is ever doing anything. I personally am a pretty busy person and have 1-2 days free from work or gigs a week, and this was an extremely hard assignment to complete on my free days seeing as my friends and family members always had things for me to do around the house. I had finally settled on an activity. I would take care of a family member's dog for a long weekend. After putting in about twenty more hours in then I had to, I was finally free of the burden of the old pooch. The thing wouldn't stop barking the whole weekend and was frequently bothered by one of my own dogs, the poor old thing. Now here's where I get loving furious. I can't count this for my project which is an ungodly 10% of my grade, just because a family member on the other side of the country had an event up here in Minnesota, and left his dog in my care. Not only am I being graded on whether I helped the community, but also if I did not help a relative in any way. So relatives, (which technically speaking everyone on the earth is a relative to someone!) do not count as the community. Rant over.

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[Xeidious*]

Well that sucks, guess they're just finding more and more dumb things for you to do in school nowadays, instead of teaching you stuff you should know in life that's actually relevant to getting by in the world, the instead waste time and grade you on.... if you did a small thing for the community or not. Love the way that sounds.

[Xealyth]

my school makes us work like, 3-5 hours on something, and counts it as 15 hours if we do an essay
they know how stupid the whole system is
if you want me to help community, give me money to go to college and ill gladly help communities

[Spartan 319]

Well that sucks, guess they're just finding more and more dumb things for you to do in school nowadays, instead of teaching you stuff you should know in life that's actually relevant to getting by in the world, the instead waste time and grade you on.... if you did a small thing for the community or not. Love the way that sounds.

Out and in context it sounds unreasonable and reasonable. The standard core curriculum is so inefficient it leaves little or no time for apprenticeships, internships, co-op programs, projects, and other ways of “learning by doing." This creates many other problems as well, such as what gets tested, gets taught. Because, unlike all other thought processes, short-term memory can be measured with precision, traditional testing has emphasized it.
The ability to remember is, of course important, but the main educational challenge—making better sense of real-world experience—requires the ability not merely to recall but to infer, generalize, hypothesize, relate, synthesize, value, and so on.

[Spartan 319]

my school makes us work like, 3-5 hours on something, and counts it as 15 hours if we do an essay
they know how stupid the whole system is
if you want me to help community, give me money to go to college and ill gladly help communities

I agree entirely, well put.

[Katadeus]

I had to do like 20 as well. I worked at a local library. It was actually kinda fun.

[AutoBahn]

Well that sucks, guess they're just finding more and more dumb things for you to do in school nowadays, instead of teaching you stuff you should know in life that's actually relevant to getting by in the world, the instead waste time and grade you on.... if you did a small thing for the community or not. Love the way that sounds.

Believe it or not, it's relevant to college; colleges will often lower the bar for people who commit time to community service of some kind. At my old school, every last friday of the month was dedicated to everyone going out and helping at community centers for a day; parents of kids at the school drove everybody to where they were assigned to for the year. It was pretty enjoyable at the time actually, but only because I was doing it with friends.
OP, if you need a quick way to add a few hours of community service to your belt, ask around at local churches, dog shelters, or see if there's community service groups or clubs in your city that you can get involved in. Grabbing a few friends to help makes it easier to swallow too, if that's necessary.

[Epicduke]

my county gives all the hours to us with the required classes
but I am in boh scouts so if I need a failsafe I can just fall back onto those service hours

[shamester]

Pffffffff getting these service hours are easy, i volunteered at a hospital working at the front desk 3 times a wekk and got over 200 service hours

[Headcrab Zombie]

Sounds like you didn't read the assignment criteria. I could have told you, without knowing anything anything about the assignment, that watching a relative's dog doesn't count as community service

[Spartan 319]

Sounds like you didn't read the assignment criteria. I could have told you, without knowing anything anything about the assignment, that watching a relative's dog doesn't count as community service

You got a good point, no problem there, I recognize it was partially my fault, but I recall another student getting a passing grade after turning in a journal of his hours for his cousins, so that pertains to the situation. Either way, I shouldn't have to lose ten percent of my grade to a small loving foible.

[Spartan 319]

Another issue I'm having with this is that if community service is required to graduate, this means that some students will try to fill the minimum level that is needed which misdirects the purpose of community service which also makes it a problem of morality. It is the same thing for me. Since I didn't really want to do it.

[Nonnel]

lol I didn't know anyone ever actually did their school community service hours

[Spartan 319]

lol I didn't know anyone ever actually did their school community service hours

True lmao

[Spartan 319]

From a user based voting website,
Community service should not be required in schools for three reasons.
1. Community service is all about giving back. If you're only doing it to get something(A grade) out of it, you're missing the point.
2. Students have so much expected of them already. With sports, clubs, and academics, high school students have a lot on their plates. Requiring them to serve would just take away from their achievements in other areas.
3. For lower income students, it doesn't make sense. Why should a student do volunteer work when her family is struggling? A paid job would feed her siblings. Volunteer work would not.