Climbing The Service Ladder

Many of our students have the passion and motivation to continue as community volunteers throughout their college career. In recognition of this, we are designing incentives for them to continue their development as community volunteers and leaders through the “Service Learning Career Ladder”. This career ladder will provide opportunities for students to be involved in service learning annually during their time on our campus, progressing from entry level service experiences to senior level experiences where they will assume a leadership role in our programs. CCRE will play an increasingly larger role in the development of our students as servant leaders who grow intellectually, experientially, and emotionally through their service experiences, assisting students in creating linkages between their academic and experiential activities.

As we plan ahead, the following forms an outline for our goals for the career ladder.

(i) Journey of Transformation in conjunction with service learning: We invite 10 faculty to incorporate Service Learning into their course in the Fall. This represents an increase to approximately 200 SH students who need to be placed at a school or non-profit organization, serving approximately 1000 individuals. The scope for much further growth is, of course, vast and exciting, if not also a little daunting!

(i) Journey Further: Students who wish to volunteer at their site for another semester will be encouraged to do so, once they have demonstrated the commitment to do so. In many cases, individuals from the community such as young struggling students need stability, care, and guidance from their mentor. We must create this opportunity if we are to be visible for the long term among our partners. All parties can benefit from this matching. SH students would receive additional tutoring / mentoring / leadership training workshops from guest speakers and CCRE Director.

(ii) 50 hour ceremony: This year, CCRE established a ‘student service learning advisory board’, questions were asked regarding what would be meaningful incentives for students. Suggestions made were:

a.       Graduation pin

b.      Written mention on transcript of hours logged

c.       Milestones of service recognized

This 50 hour milestone will represent the hours of service that students record, and will be recognized at a lunch toward the end of the semester.

(i) Site Coordinators: This idea forms an integral part of a grant we are

applying for that will allow us to expand the number of SH students we provide sites for. As mentioned, 10 faculty will be invited to incorporate service learning freshmen courses, representing an increase of 3 faculty and approximately 100 students requiring placement. We are responding to this increase by increasing the number of school sites we work with from 3 to 10. This necessitated the development of new site coordinator positions at each school. These are part-time paid positions, filled by experienced undergraduate or graduate students, whose responsibility will be to report directly to the Project Coordinator.

(ii) Mentor-freshman mentee: This initiative is being developed in conjunction with the Leadership Studies Program in an attempt to match community leaders and Seton Hall alumni with emerging student leaders that have been identified through their service learning experiences. In this way, our student mentors will themselves become mentees, giving them the opportunity to reflect on their service learning and how to become a better servant leader.

(iii) Non-profit internship: Students may wish to work individually with non-profits having spent time the previous year on project development. This internship opportunity would allow them to hone their skills in an environment more directly tailored to their specific interests.

            (iv) 100 hour ceremony

(i) Substitute Teacher: As mentioned by Assistant Principal Carlo from Newton Street, students have the option to pursue part-time employment as a substitute teacher once they have accumulated 60 credits. This will allow them to earn over $100 a day while improving their skills at working with children.

            (ii) Stand alone Programs, eg, run sports program or environmental AS program:

            (iii) CCRE interns and special projects

(iv) Non-profit internship

            (v) 200 hour club

(i) Substitute Teacher

(ii) Non-profit part-time hire: Representing a career ladder, this will provide a paid opportunity for students who have spent almost 2 years with a non-profit to actively engage in paid part-time employment. This is predicted to occur based on the students’ demonstrated dedication and leadership over an extended period of time.

(iii) Alumni Mentoring and special project

(iv) Graduating Pin

(v) 300 hour club

(vi) Service Transcript : It would be beneficial to students who have dedicated extensive time during their undergraduate education to receive official recognition on their transcript. CCRE will take steps to gauge the possibility and obstacles to this.

(vii) Graduation Pin