It is a rich form of irony that would make their English teachers beam with pride. Top students in local classrooms, having aced their recent exams, are in jeopardy of not graduating. Meanwhile, in Toronto, a government claims success while not fully understanding the concepts they hope to achieve through the new curriculum.
Forty hours of voluntary service is a mandated requirement under the new high school curriculum, which is being touted by the government as a means to put the province on par with the rest of Canada.
But according to the Canadian Oxford Dictionary, voluntary action is “done, acting, or able to act of one’s free will—not prompted by promise or threat.”
In legislating volunteer activity, this government has shown a fundamental lack of understanding of the virtue they’re hoping to elicit from students—to show genuine concern for the community.
Instead, Ontario youth are being asked to search for placements not thinking of the help they could be offering, not with an eye to gaining personal skills but simply to fulfill a requirement. Can anyone blame volunteer organizations for not wanting to take on these students?
In effect, the Ontario government has created a system that parallels students’ graduation with court ordered community service time.
That is the state of the program now; good students with genuine interest must prove they are exceptional just to find an interview for placement. Most other students whom this program was designed to push toward community service will almost certainly not find a position, or be turned off by the regimented giving of their time.
Many would be quick to interject here that 40 hours over four years is not a huge commitment and essentially, those students who wait risk the consequences. While this is true, however, it does not satisfy concerns about the value of the requirement in giving students community experience.
If there is true will to instill the spirit of community in students, certainly there is a better way to achieve the goal. The system has not been set up for students to succeed. Just as they need the structure of textbooks and exams to fulfill other diploma requirements, a structure is needed for the volunteer component to be meaningful.
Schools should be equipped with lists of associations that have a real need for students’ involvement; placement plans should be in place when students first hit Grade 9.
Or, as most associations are looking for more mature students, a specific structured placement or apprenticeship course could be integrated into a student’s final year to foster the intended learning atmosphere. It would be a graded, formal commitment, providing legitimacy that is currently not in place.
The students would know how they have to perform and by when to graduate. At present, the volunteer commitment seems arbitrary, its effect unclear. The notion that the govenrment actually did its homework and improved the education system is equally vague.
—Adam Bramburger