Course Description:
Citizenship Seminar is a one-credit experience that gives students the opportunity to reflect on their previous years of study in the light of their duties and responsibilities as members of a larger society. It directs the student’s attention both outward with civic engagement and inward with reflection. It is intended to assist students in making a bridge between their college years and their post-college life.
I took the Citizenship 400 class in the fall of my senior year with Lane Clarke. Usually with the CIT class the individual student will choose where they do their volunteer hours but with this specific course, Lane chose to have us volunteer as a class at the Boys and Girls Club of Portland. I felt that this was a perfect fit for me as I was already spending my days in Portland. We would go once a week for one hour to play games, help with homework, and just be a friend to the kids in the club.
Pasted below is my proposal from the beginning of the semester that outlined a bit of the Boys and Girls Club history and my thoughts on completing my volunteering hours there:
Civic Engagement Proposal
Holly DeRusha
During this fall semester Citizenship Engagement course, my classmates and I will be volunteering at the Boys & Girls Club after school program in Portland, Maine. A man by the name of Rousseau stated the original definition of citizenship in the 1700’s describing it as “a citizen who is an autonomous individual who can consent or withhold consent to rulers.” The definition has shifted greatly over the years and is described in our UNE core curriculum as a student’s “opportunity to reflect on their previous years of study in the light of their duties and responsibilities as members of a larger society.” This modern day taking of what citizenship means will be applied over the next few months as we work within the Boys & Girls club as we immerge ourselves in to the Portland community and act as positive role models for low income and struggling students.
In the past ten years the Boys & Girls Clubs of America have successfully combined the benefits of after-school programs and thorough research to create stronger futures for America’s youth. Separate studies have shown that providing after-school care in low socioeconomic areas by keeping students busy, off the streets, and from going back to an empty home at the end of their school day. Information from the Boys & Girls Clubs of America website shares many of the programs findings that support the positive effects of after-school care. One statistic shows that youth (ages 9-12) students in the Boys & Girls club are 38 percent more likely to believe that their schoolwork is meaningful. They also share that 97 percent of teen-aged club members expect to graduate from High School.
Ben Warner hosted a Ted Talk about the new models of civic engagement being brought to light in America. He stated, “As people get involved in communities and start to share the things they value, they transform the values of the community.” In any community one of the top values should be meeting the needs of the children and putting effort towards their future regardless of socioeconomic status. The Boys & Girls Clubs of America are actively fighting to meet these needs and I am looking forward to spending my semester volunteering with them and learning more about their research.
Entering my senior year as an Educational Studies student I have three years of experience in the classroom to take with me moving forward. I expect to be faced with the usual challenges of working with the youth and figuring out what each individual student needs to learn something new by the end of every day. I hope to be able to step outside of my “classroom mode” and enjoy the lighter environment of an after- school program because this is something I have not had very much experience with. I know exhausted students can be by the end of a school day and I want to help make it just as much of an enjoyable of an experience for them as it will be for me.
I’m glad that we had the chance to research the history of the Boys and Girls Club before we began volunteering. This allowed myself and my classmates to think about the bigger picture and the impact that places like this have on the children in our community.
