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Stepping Out
Last week I talked about meeting with perhaps my oldest coworker, Toby White. He was my professor for an entire semester and he ended up hiring me so that I could be doing what I do now. He's someone I'm comfortable around and I see him around the office every day I work, but it was time to step out of that comfort zone. I had to leave the office and walk across campus to meet with another individual in charge of a program offered by the Lougheed Center for Applied Learning.
This individuals name is Dave Bugg. He runs what's called Service Learning and has a real heart for it. I wandered up to his office on the third floor of Satterlee Hall and awaited his arrival. He was a few minutes late, which didn't matter to me because I get paid by the hour, and he looked as if he had a million things on his mind, which he did. His wife had just given birth to twins and we were meeting on one of the first days he was back at work after being there for his expanding family.
Inside his office, I was impressed by his ability to keep track of things and have a perfect sense of what needs to go where and what he's thinking about. He had a remarkable prioritization thought process that I hope I can acquire one day. I introduced myself and explained my purpose in meeting with him, where I'm from, what I hope students can benefit from this interview, and we started talking. I came into his office not knowing a single thing about Service Learning, but that was all about to change in a matter of minutes.
Dave described Service Learning as an opportunity for students to do more than just sit in a classroom. You will have to sit in a classroom, but there's so much more to Service Learning than that. It's a typical course with a regular teacher, classroom, assignments, etc. but it focuses on doing things for the community and reflecting on your service. It's available for any major and the entire program itself is open to ideas so if you have some thoughts on how you'd like to earn credits by helping the community there's nothing stopping you from trying to make that a reality. All the faculty involved are nice, genuine, hard workers who will pay attention, make time, and prepare as much as they can for the students to have as beneficial of an experience as possible.
Logistics wise, at some point in the semester you have to put in somewhere around 12 hours of service. You can do more or less, and that depends on what type of service you're doing. Some students take on projects that require more time, others make smaller time commitments to get the job done. These hours should get taken care of before the end of the semester because the other half of Service Learning is learning. You don't just get your credits by putting in the hours.
The reason it's called Service Learning is because you have to do both of those things. Serve and learn. The learning part of this process can be very extensive and deep. You reflect on what your service meant to yourself, to your peers, to the community, and specific people inside the community as well. It's a good life experience and something you can't accomplish while staying trapped behind a desk all semester. You make experiences with connections with people that are meaningful whether they last a weekend or a lifetime.
Dave really stressed how beneficial Service Learning is on a multitude of levels. It positively affects members of your community, other classmates, your teacher, and yourself, even in the years to come. It can make a long lasting legacy of positivity and follow you throughout your life. It will be a unique experience to put on resumes and certainly a conversation starter when it comes to job interviews or family gatherings where the only question you hear is either about your relationship status or how school is going.
Whatever the service is, there's someone who will benefit from it and there will be something to learn about the experience. That experience will stick with you as long as you want it to. I hope you, the audience, reads this and feels inspired to brainstorm ideas for service and make appointments to talk about what you have in mind with Dave. I'm sure he'd love to see more students walking through his door, even with two new family members to worry about.
Here's to hoping, and thanks for reading.