Have you ever been asked how important you think your service work is? Well, I have.
I actually remember being given a piece of paper after a service event and being instructed to rank on a scale of 1 to 10 how important I thought my contribution was. Granted this was in high school and they were collecting data for a report, but I still remember thinking, “seriously.” A few weeks ago in class we touched on this subject, and with the end of the semester creeping up on us, I have been thinking about it even more. How do we assess the impact we made? Checking a box from 1 to 10 is easy, but what does that really tell us? Like we mentioned in class we can count hours and say that we did 50 hours of service, but still that tells us nothing. Certaintly, we can look at those we effected through service and see that we feed them or raised money for their cause or cleaned up their park, but still that only tells part of the story. For me, the way I want to assess how much service I really did or its impact is by looking at me. I want to reflect on how I have changed because of the service I have done. So what does this look like? It depends on you. Personally, I want to count the number of new friends I have made through serving. I want to revisit all of the moments that made me laugh, smile or cry at the various events I have attended. I want to remember facts I have learned. Most importantly, I want to explore who I was before in comparsion to who I am now. Am I more understanding, sympathetic, or patient? It can be anything. I ask that you guys also take a look back on everything you have accomplished this year and join me in eveluating yourself. That way you can see how far you have come and all the room you still have to grow.
April 24th, 2013 at 11:04 am
I feel like hours are a good representation of service. I feel like if you have a summary of the work done on an hourly basis. I do however agree that just writing a number puts tell us nothing.
April 24th, 2013 at 6:51 pm
Somebody could out in 30 hours in one place, or they could put on 30 hours at 15 different places. I think the effectivness of service depends if what you did there was meaningful, not how many hours you did. For instance, 2 hours of invasive species removal will do only a fair amount and the plant will grow back faster, but if you put in 30 hours, you could get A LOT more done and can make a meaningful dent in the removal of the plant!
I also think that on a personal level, your connection with your service is very important, becasue you can gain just as much from a service event as the person you are serving recieves.