Grammar Gazette- Issue 2, 2015

/ 09

ACTIVE SERVICE

AUTHOR Mrs Lynne Mungomery Director of Service

‘While undertaking my community service with the ACCF, I was trusted to undertake varied tasks, all of which I enjoyed and the significance of the staff’s trust in me was not lost on me.’ Ayesha Kumar (10G) is a volunteer with the ‘student 2 student’ buddy reading programme facilitated by The Smith Family. Ayesha has volunteered to read one hour per week, using a provided mobile phone and text, with an eleven-year-old Indigenous student from North Queensland. Ayesha has said that her buddy is ‘eager to read when I call her and she seems to enjoy this one- on-one time with me. ... I feel a sense of responsibility knowing that she is waiting for my call and it is nice to know that I am doing something to help someone else.’ Accounts of active citizenship and community engagement are most inspiring, as is the empathy expressed when a volunteer is asked ‘how do you feel about that?’. An important outcome of our Year 10 Community Service Programme is for students to want to continue to give back and to make a contribution to their community in the future, whether it be through participation in senior service, a service and charity group at Girls Grammar, or into their post-secondary lives.

EXPOSING GIRLS TO A HOLISTIC EDUCATION THAT INCLUDES A RANGE OF EXPERIENCES AND LIFE-WIDE LEARNING OPPORTUNITIES IS A SIGNIFICANT PART OF A GIRLS GRAMMAR EDUCATION.

The Year 10 Community Service programme is integrated into the Student Care and Ethics programme to help students develop character, empathy, and compassion for others. While their contribution to the local community is significant, the programme aims to assist students as they ponder not, ‘What am I going to be?’, but rather ‘Who am I going to be?’. The service experience is independently organised by Year 10 students. Girls decide what they have to give or share with others, and then they must step up to the challenge of communicating, organising and scheduling their time to fulfil this commitment. A misconception is that this community service equates to work experience; however, our Service Programme encourages students to give back to their community. Students are likely to develop work- ready skills, but this is not work experience. Through participation in community service, students engage in activities to meet actual community needs, as an integrated aspect of the curriculum ( Cress, Collier & Reitenauer, 2005). The value of the programme is measured through the reflection process, which lends new significance to what we are learning. It allows us to compare initial goals and objectives with eventual outcomes (Cress et al., 2005). It is a delight to hear students describe the thoughts, conversations and sharing of emotions following the time spent in the service of others. This is a transformative experience as they express how their service has created a shift in their thinking, as they realise that they actually can contribute to a better world, be it on a large or small scale. Year 10 students choose from a variety of service placements, including local Communify Neighbourhood Centres, the Red Hill Special School, the Prince Charles Hospital Foundation and volunteering in aged care facilities. Alexandra Wilson (11H) volunteered at the Australian Cervical Cancer Foundation (ACCF), assisting the ACCF and Girls Grammar to ‘share the message not the (HPV) virus’ so that people can get the necessary information to allow for informed decisions and defeat the lack of awareness that exists about cervical and other gynaecological cancers.

Ayesha Kumar (10G) reads to her buddy over her mobile phone as part of The Smith Family’s student 2 student reading programme.

Alexandra Wilson (11H) volunteering at the Australian Cervical Cancer Foundation.

REFERENCES Cress, C. (2005). What is service learning? In Learning through Service. Virginia: Stylish Publishing.

Wilson, A. (2014). B GGS Community Service Programme - ACCF Reflection.

SPRING ISSUE / 2015