Despite This Year’s Emphasis on Service Learning, Students See Room for Expansion

Three clubs on campus comprise the readily accessible service learning opportunities on campus.

This year in particular, Middlesex has been striving to include more opportunities for community service and service learning for students. Mr. Harris has taken on a new role as Director of Service Learning in addition to serving as the Director of Student activities. Service learning is a specific approach to the more generic “community service” that seeks to apply the learning that students get in classroom settings to helping effectively in the real world. 

Service learning has begun to take hold at Middlesex. In the beginning of the year, seniors participated in “a day of service” as a part of orientation. Groups of seniors traveled to help out at various organizations, such as Cradles to Crayons in Newton. 

There are several different clubs on campus that focus on community service and giving back to neighboring communities, such as Helping Hands, Volunteer for Veterans, and Letters for Elders. Some of these clubs, including Helping Hands, prioritize service learning by physically participating in acts of service, whereas Letters for Elders and Volunteer for Veterans focus mainly on spreading encouragement to people in need of cheer by way of letters or other means. 

When asked about her experience with service learning, Avery Green, a junior day student, shared that she has participated in community service over her past three years at Middlesex. However, while acknowledging that Middlesex has been putting a larger focus on service learning and community service opportunities this year than her previous years, Avery wishes that there was more community service integrated into her schedule and that students would get the opportunity to form relations with organizations in neighboring towns. Additionally, another anonymous student offered up that they had participated in service over their years at Middlesex, including writing cards for Volunteer for Veterans and Letters for Elders, as well as volunteering for Cradles to Crayons alongside Helping Hands club. This student agrees with Avery that service opportunities are accessible, suggesting that they would go to a different club and ask about the prospect of volunteering at a specific organization. Additionally, this student referred to different alternatives to sports that revolve around partnering with nearby organizations in service learning as valuable opportunities, such as the Nashoba Brooks internship and volunteering at the Meeting House. This student believes that while Middlesex has vastly increased in its implementation of service learning and community service under the new leadership of Mrs. Spears, one can always give back more to their community. This is all to say that there can never be enough service learning opportunities, and we as a community should strive to seek out these experiences whenever we can.

Caroline Barton