On the home page: Shawn Robinson and Kate Baldacci think Democracy Matters.
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Citizen scholars
Through UMass Amherst's Community Service Learning programs, students do well by doing good.
Senior Kate Baldacci looks forward to taking breaks from her hectic schedule for the “endearingly simple things” her eight-year-old “Little Sister” enjoys, like “sitting on the Amherst Common or going for a slice of pizza at Antonio’s.” Baldacci got involved with the local chapter of Big Brothers Big Sisters through the Office of Community Service Learning (OCSL) at Commonwealth College, the honors college at UMass Amherst. Other students wade icy waters to restock salmon; serve up hot meals to the homeless, tutor teenagers, work in an animal shelter, and do other volunteer activities. OCSL helps students put their desire to help others into action—and earn academic credits. Perhaps the greatest benefit, though, is that the students’ community work illuminates what they read and talk about in courses, and vice versa.
Enabling students to integrate these two ways of learning is OSCL’s aim. Through its various programs, more than 100 courses with a CSL option, and CSL courses students design themselves with faculty sponsorship, students put classroom theories to the test, try on a career in, say, social work, and feel useful.
OCSL’s Alternative Spring Break program sends students packing—packing their bags to go work harder that week in March than they may any other week of the semester. A group of 20 undergrads might drive to coastal Virginia to read to preschoolers or clean up a vacant lot for the low-income residents of a small town. Others might do similar projects just a half-hour away from campus, in Holyoke. Wherever they go, usually they return as excited as if they’d been partying at Cancun.
IMPACT! brings 24 freshmen together in Butterfield dorm. As part of the yearlong program they attend small CSL classes, such as the first-semester “American Diversity,” and volunteer two to three hours a week at, for instance, a local senior center. Living on the same floor, they have plenty of opportunities to swap notes about what they’re learning.
Baldacci is in her second-year of the Citizen Scholar Program which combines coursework (five classes over four semesters), community service, and activism. Besides hanging out with her Little Sister, she serves on the advisory board of the local Big Brothers Big Sisters chapter and has helped organize their fundraising events. She’s still a bit flabbergasted when “in a meeting with 25 adults, one of them will turn to me and ask, ‘What do you think, Kate?’” Her first year, Baldacci was campus coordinator for Democracy Matters, an organization that works for public funding of elections.
One thing Balacci loves about the Citizen Scholar program is how “my participation in organizations is mirroring the flow of the CSL courses,” a flow that begins with a focus on theory, then looks at ways to change society, and culminates with each student designing and implementing a community organizing project of her own. Baldacci’s will be starting a Big Brothers Big Sisteres chapter right on campus.
Junior Shawn Robinson, a first-year Citizen Scholar, has been involved in community projects since ninth grade, when he and some friends put together a spring break “Culture Camp,” for young children. Their idea was so successful, it became a regular school vacation program. He says his early interest in helping others stems from the fact that both his parents work for the state’s department of mental retardation. A sociology major, he finds his volunteer work dovetails with his schoolwork, and there are other benefits. “I’ve learned how to negotiate in meetings,” he says cheerfully. Indeed: last year Robinson was the sole student on the Massachusetts Board of Higher Education.
Robinson transferred to UMass Amherst from Holyoke Community College, where he was active in student government. Last year, he says, “I was loving college, but I was leaving. [UMass professor] Art Keene called and met with me during the summer to tell me about the CSL program. It had a huge impact on me. The massive university was made so much smaller by a professor reaching out to me. I joined a community of people right from the beginning.” Although Robinson’s just a few weeks into his first year as a Citizen Scholar, he is already busy as Baldacci’s successor in Democracy Matters, circulating petitions and holding meetings. The experience will help him once he’s pursuing a career as an administrator in higher education. His ultimate goal? Nothing less than free higher education for everyone.
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Community Service Learning at UMass Amherst