Students volunteer as part of classroom curriculum
Bryan Rothamel
Issue date: 4/24/09 Section: News
Volunteering involves more than just helping people. The United Way of America's president is a man with a master's degree in business administration. The American Red Cross' president is a woman who taught at the Harvard Business School. Volunteering is much more than just doing the work.
Just ask students of the volunteerism and philanthropy class taught by Dr. Christine Cugliari. As part of their curriculum, the class, comprised of seven students, is volunteering once a week at Fairview Elementary through a program offered by Communities in Schools.
"It has been wonderful at how receptive the High Point students have been of going off campus and volunteering," Cugliari said.
The students are connecting the information provided by the textbook to real world experiences. The students have learned how to "recruit, select, orient, train, evaluate, and all of that stuff [in getting volunteers]," said Cugliari.
For at least eight sessions, the HPU students travel to Fairview to tutor third graders in reading. These elementary students are "bubble" students on the fringe of passing their end of grade tests.
The class teamed up with Leigh Ayers, who is the volunteer coordinator for Communities in Schools and an HPU alumna. Students then were oriented to the program, filled out an application and went through a background check to be able to tutor.
The program hasn't been easy for the HPU students. On the first day the students went to Fairview, an HPU student was not connecting well with an elementary student that they were tutoring, said Cugliari. After a few weeks of getting acquainted the elementary student waits at the door for his tutor to arrive.
"Now the High Point students have a much better picture of why you have to do applications for volunteers, why you have to do background checks.
"The biggest one was, 'Oh, we want to know how our kids did. Have we made a difference?' That was really a good illustration of why when we work with volunteers you have to provide feedback; let them know their impact," Cugliari said.
Just ask students of the volunteerism and philanthropy class taught by Dr. Christine Cugliari. As part of their curriculum, the class, comprised of seven students, is volunteering once a week at Fairview Elementary through a program offered by Communities in Schools.
"It has been wonderful at how receptive the High Point students have been of going off campus and volunteering," Cugliari said.
The students are connecting the information provided by the textbook to real world experiences. The students have learned how to "recruit, select, orient, train, evaluate, and all of that stuff [in getting volunteers]," said Cugliari.
For at least eight sessions, the HPU students travel to Fairview to tutor third graders in reading. These elementary students are "bubble" students on the fringe of passing their end of grade tests.
The class teamed up with Leigh Ayers, who is the volunteer coordinator for Communities in Schools and an HPU alumna. Students then were oriented to the program, filled out an application and went through a background check to be able to tutor.
The program hasn't been easy for the HPU students. On the first day the students went to Fairview, an HPU student was not connecting well with an elementary student that they were tutoring, said Cugliari. After a few weeks of getting acquainted the elementary student waits at the door for his tutor to arrive.
"Now the High Point students have a much better picture of why you have to do applications for volunteers, why you have to do background checks.
"The biggest one was, 'Oh, we want to know how our kids did. Have we made a difference?' That was really a good illustration of why when we work with volunteers you have to provide feedback; let them know their impact," Cugliari said.
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