Civic Engagement Goodness

All right, Civic Engagement – post-discussion – still to me can simply be defined as: the action of bettering or improving one’s community whether local or global. For us, for our Paideia group, I am convinced that though we are perfectly capable of accomplishing great change in our GTown community, that we could only near our fullest potential by splitting into at least two groups with two different projects though with a unifying theme or agenda (the groups would have to be about as equal in number as possible). I take this stand not because I think we couldn’t work together toward one singular goal but because I feel that our greatest strength is also our greatest weakness – our diversity. Given everyone’s differing views, firm opinions, varying talents, and divergent comfort zones, I really just don’t see any way for all of us to settle on one specific project that will allow all of us to feel fulfilled and satisfied with at the end of it.
As for this idea of fulfillment and satisfaction, I do believe that this is a necessary part of the Civic Engagement project. It’s hardly selfish or self-righteous to be happy and glad to be doing a project or to feel good about helping others. In fact, I actually feel that by forcing anyone in the group to participate in a project they aren’t passionate about or interested in will basically force them into a position to feel and/or practice self-righteousness simply because then not only are they put in a position to feel resentful of those they’ll be helping but they’ll also have no positives to take out of the experience to allow them to connect to anything and so will only create a clearer bridge for them to feel sanctimonious or superior to those they’re meant to be bringing up and reassuring of their worth and equality – whether it be children, homeless, or the elderly.
At any rate, if we were to break into these two suggested groups, I feel that the idea of using the age contrast between working with the elderly and working with children was absolutely beautiful – especially so given our group and the theme of Human Behavior. Personally, while I do see the vast importance and great advantages and positives of working with children, I myself am not very good at working with them, let alone teaching them sports (as all who were there to witness my stunning lack of volleyball and dodge ball skills can testify). However, I can also understand the strangeness and fear of working with the elderly – it is actually a common fear and one that I have spent most of my high school years grappling with and would certainly feel more comfortable continuing on with rather than diverting back to sports and day camping. I see the skills and abilities in our group to handle and excel at both ends of the spectrum and I just think it would be wrong to try and force all of our efforts into one section or project when we could, in my opinion, benefit both ourselves and our communities much more by diversifying and then reconvening together for our normal biweekly lunch meetings.
As far as organization, research, and the prospect of group leaders go, it really does depend on what we decide to do within each group. If the group focusing on children were to decide to work with sports then yes, I think they would benefit greatly from group leaders whereas I feel that if the group working with the elderly were to simply be reading to the bedridden or just sitting and spending time with them, leaders would be unnecessary. Also, I don’t think working through a preexisting organization – where the service project with the elderly would be concerned – would be at all necessary whereas, given our time and funding constraints (not to mention all the legality details and hula hoops that are always tacked on to projects with children), I don’t see how we could manage any sort of project involving children without the support of a preexisting organization.
I apologize for not having more specific ideas on this last front to propose but given the level of uncertainty we seem to be lingering at, I don’t want to presume too much and leave someone else in the group at large feeling isolated or shushed out in some way. I’m happy to be argued with – I only want for every member of our group to be able to participate in a project that means something to them as well as those they’d be working for. All in all, for myself, I feel like working with the elderly is what would be most fulfilling for me, something that I would be happy to perpetuate for the remainder or the school year and perhaps even on throughout my junior and senior year and in that way, through this level of enjoyment from service, I believe that I (and we) could make a much bigger difference than possible with a simple one-Saturday fund raiser or such.

Here’s to hopin’,
Katie