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By Dharshani Dharmawardena

Daily Bruin Senior Staff

In an age when more and more college students are finding less time to volunteer, some universities are instituting community service requirements for graduation.

Students like Henry Lam, chief of staff of the Student Welfare Commission and Recycling Director, said there is a need for more student participation in the community and even encourages a university-wide requirement for graduation.

“I have a real concern that there are not enough people who do community work,” he said. “Depending on the specifics, in terms of there being a community service requirement, I’m in support of that.

“I wish people would have a real desire or passion for community service,” he continued. “But for now, for most people, it’s not a reality. In the meantime, there may be a real need for a requirement.”

Gov. Gray Davis called for a state-wide community service requirement in 1999, and some universities, like the California State system, have implemented such a policy.

UCLA, however, currently has no such guideline.

Other universities are also offering service-learning programs which seek to integrate classroom learning with the real world instead of requiring students to volunteer.

“Basically, service-learning is students engaged in community service in connection with an academic course,” said Elaine Ikeda, former director of the Service-Learning Clearinghouse of UCLA.

Funded by the nationally-known Corporation for National Service, the SLC of UCLA attempts to get the faculty members to include community service in the class curriculum, according to Ikeda.

If a professor wants to include some form of community service into the course syllabus, he or she can call SLC, which will then help them get started, Ikeda said.

“We share information about where to find resources, like which foundations give money and how to motivate people,” she said.

Currently, courses like Education 193, “Community Service Outreach for Academic Achievement” and Bio 40, “AIDS and Other Sexually Transmitted Diseases” incorporate community service with course material.

Though some people attribute apathy among the young to a downward trend in volunteering, Ikeda said other reasons contribute to the problem.

“I don’t think it’s apathy,” she said. “We see a big drop off when they come to college.”

Ikeda explained that although research has shown the number of high school seniors performing community service has increased over the years, the number participating in college has decreased.

“College students are more stressed than ever,” Ikeda continued. “They’re feeling a lot of pressure about things, especially at a school like UCLA.”

Because college students can spend little time to volunteer, Ikeda said, service-learning can provide students with the ability to both study and help the community as well as giving them a more interactive project than writing papers.

She said that integrating both learning and service experiences, the main ingredients in service learning, gives college students the time to do community service while still receiving credit for an academic course.

“They’re learning the content and through that they’re also doing community service,” she said.

“That’s why having it part of a course makes more sense,” she explained. “It’s not separate – it’s a part of their lives.”

Lam, who considers himself an environmental activist, said students show little concern for protests and petitions held on campus.

Like Ikeda, Lam said he thought academic pressure rather than apathy or distrust in the government leads to young people’s lack of involvement in the community.

“All the stress of college life has enveloped life,” he said. “The daily grind pushes community activism to the background.”

Studying for exams and going to class often leaves little time to spend on community volunteering, Lam said.

He added that complacency may contribute to less action.

“People are happy or satisfied with the the situation,” Lam said. “They’re willing to tolerate the situation where they are satisfied enough not to do anything.”

While the SLC can provide resources, handle logistics and training workshops, some problems can still irk faculty members trying to establish a curriculum involving service-learning.

The time required for planning the course and handling details like contacting agencies and overseeing service can create difficulty in facilitating a service-learning program, according to the SLC Project Web site.

In addition to UCLA, other universities have utilized the concept of service-learning – relating service experience to course content.

Stanford University, for example, established its Ethics in Society program in the philosophy department to encourage the analysis of societal practices, both individual and institutional.

One of its philosophy courses specifically explores how ethical theories and philosophical discussion apply to the world.

In the past few years, the class has focused on poverty, racism and social injustices.

Eric Beerbohm, who now studies at Oxford University, participated in a class at Stanford called “Equality of What Between Whom?” which questioned the theories of justice and fairness with the university’s disability policy.

He said taking the course not only enabled him to look beyond his own suburban perspective and prejudices, but it also gave reality to the information he had learned in class.

“From my conversations with disabled students I gained just as much insight as from the course reader,” Beerbohm said.

Ikeda also said students participating in service-learning or community volunteering become more aware of their environments.

“Studies have shown they are more likely to vote and be more understanding of people different from them,” she said.

Ikeda added that both students and faculty members can reap the benefits of service-learning.

She said that oftentimes instructors comment on how classes once lifeless during lecture now thrive on classroom participation.

“Students say that when they get involved, it just makes the class more interesting because they went out there and met real people,” she said.

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