Experiential Learning Final Reflection

Out of professional, civic, personal, and intellectual development, I think this course had the most impact on my civic development. Volunteering at Madonna Mission, working with Catholic Charities staff, learning about refugee issues as well as learning about the different models and levels of social justice all helped me further my own understanding of what civic responsibility really is and helped me in turn fulfill that responsibility.

I’d been wanting to volunteer in previous semesters - had even had meetings and email conversations with staff at Campus Ministry talking about different options - but in the end, I never made a final commitment to any program. I was finding having knowledge of a civic responsibility and a want to fulfil it to be very different from actually doing so.  I think it was a combination of fear of the unknown, fear of over committing myself, and, somewhat embarrassingly, a fear of children. Almost all volunteer opportunities I had found were based around tutoring or working with children, which I was hesitant to partake in. A service learning based experiential class was really just what I needed to force me outside of my comfort zone and actually fulfill a civic duty. After a freshman year of debating whether or not I wanted to transfer and whether or not Chicago was really the place for me, four years later this city is truly my home and place I love and care deeply about. In the words of Kevin Coval, “Chicago has my heart”.  I knew that I wanted to volunteer in the city and I felt the civic responsibility, but I lacked the drive and the commitment. A Loyola graduation requirement plus an option to choose a class that would force me to volunteer was the push I needed to fulfil this civic duty. Getting to work on a project for Catholic Charities and then actually being able to teach a session to some of the refugee youth was particularly special. To create something that might be used for many more years was a different kind of volunteering than I usually think of, but I realized still just as important. So, I think Madonna Mission and the project for Catholic Charities are what really helped my civic development.

Actually learning about social justice as a general topic was also helpful towards my civic development. Previously, when I thought of civic duties all that really came to mind was voting, jury duty, maybe charity and maybe volunteering. But, looking at catholic social teaching, the two feet of a justice, and the wheel of justice in class showed that there are actually a lot of ways to participate in justice and charity. In particular, ways that don’t necessarily break the bank. Learning about an asset based community development plan also really impacted my view of civic responsibility. In all my previous philosophy classes where I have learned about methods of social justice and ways of providing assistance towards development, I had never heard of an asset based plan. It was impactful though to rearrange my thoughts on civic duties away from what I, as a relatively well off student, can provide and shift towards thinking about what assets are already in the community and how they can be grown and strengthened. I think volunteering at Madonna Mission actually really fits in with that because working as a tutor is really only just helping the students develop the intelligence they already have.

In terms of Loyola’s mission to ‘expand knowledge in the service of humanity through learning, justice, and faith’, I do feel like I’ve come out the other side of this engaged learning class having accomplished that. As as statistics major that wants to go into human rights statistics and program evaluation for development plans, broadening my own knowledge of refugee topics and the social and economic problems around it was enlightening. Hopefully, it will be knowledge I continue to carry with my as I move forwards and try to do my part towards achieving justice.