Prosser Public Library
I really enjoyed doing Community Service.
Contemporary Issues dealt with everyday issues in society, media, politics, and was a fun class that I took my senior year of high school.
The first thing that come to
people's mind when they think of Community Service usually is that someone is
working off a criminal record. That is usually the conception that people have
of juvenile delinquents or people who have had criminal records. Trust me when
I say this, there are a lot of people who do Community Service for voluntary
work or in my case for a school project for Contemporary Issues class. It was
my senior year of high school I was 18 going on 19. Contemporary Issues was a
new class that was added to the high school teaching curriculum and class of
1997 had to take that class and do Community Service in order to graduate. I
learned a lot from that class, me along with a lot of students learned that we
not only had a new class but also a new teacher. We learned that the teacher
who we was supposed to have got a better offer to be a Vice Principal at
Suffield high school in Suffield. As a class we learned to adapt to our new
home room teacher. Contemporary Issues was a class that dealt with issues such
as discrimination of all kinds, politics, media, etc. I was getting a good feel
for the class and for some reason kept delaying to do my Community Service. I
was the type of student that was at my best when "my back was up against
the wall" meaning I always seemed to thrive when overcoming a lot of
adversity. Community Service was 1/3 (33%) of our grade and this included the
self-evaluation that the director or supervisor had to do for our Community
Service hours (we had to complete 24 hours of Community Service). The early
people made sure that they started doing their Community Service in October of
1996, November of 1996, December of 1996, etc. I on the other hand, waited like
late February of 1997 and early March of 1997 to do an assignment that was do
in late April of 1997 and early May of 1997.
I am
thinking that it was time for me to act very quickly if I was going to get my
Community Service hours in. The assignment was worth 33% of my grade.
Mathematically, in order to pass Contemporary Issues class without doing
Community Service you would have to have an average of 93-100 (too much of a
gamble to risk chancing). My average in Contemporary Issues was 70-73 and I was
thinking about how hard I worked in summer school in 1996 to make up for
failing 2 of the 4 classes my Junior year of high school. I decided to make an
appointment and meet with the director at Prosser Public Library in Bloomfield.
The woman I will never forget her name was Elaine (not quite sure of her last
name) and Elaine had a chance to explain to me what I would be doing while
doing my 24 hours of Community Service. I would be in charge of shelving books,
magazines, and videos in alphabetical order by last names and titles. Elaine
mentioned to me about doing a sign in/out sheet where I would sign in every
time I came to the library and sign out every time I was done that particular
day. I was very eager to work because I had a little less than 2 months
to complete my Community Service and I gave Elaine my self-evaluation paper
that she had to fill out on how well or not well I was working at the Library.
Once I started working I remember working 1 1/2 hours for the first time I was
working at the library and my hours gradually increased every time I went to
Prosser Public Library. I finished off my Community Service hours by doing
consecutive 8 hours from 9 AM-5 PM on Friday and Saturday. One of the
Librarians noticed how hard I was working and offered to pay me for my service.
I kindly told her "no" because I had to work at the library for my
Community Service. By the time I was done with my Community Service, it took me
approximately 3 weeks to complete 24 hours. Elaine, the director of the library
wrote such a really good self-evaluation about me, it looked like a letter of
recommendation. Elaine complimented on how eager I was at working at the
library and getting in my 24 hours of Community Service, on how hard I was
working at the library, and on how much I did a very good job shelving books,
magazines, and videos in a very well organized way in alphabetical order, and
on how I did all that was asked of me. I was so glad to complete Community
Service and I wound up getting an 80 (I had a 78 but the teacher was convinced
to give me 2 extra points for working so hard). My senior year I graduated
along with 112 classmates with B's and C's at 19 on June 13, 1997.
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