Service

Experience:

I completed two experiences to fulfill the requirements for Service. The first one is being an active member in Engineering Without Boarders (EWB). It was not connected to my grand challenge. I have attended the weekly meetings with EWB since Fall 2018 when I became a member and have helped complete objectives of the team in helping a town in Costa Rica have a reliable source of clean water. For example, I organized a list of the citizens in the community and what we knew about them so that the EWB members going on the next trip will have a document to refer to. Altogether, participating in EWB will require approximately 3 hours a week for two and a half semesters. Further, I attended the 2-day EWB conference in Fall 2019. This totals approximately 128 hours. The second experience is volunteering as a math coach at a local elementary/middle school for a partnership between Lakeland Elementary and Middle School called the UMBC Lakeland Math Coach Program. Tutoring children is directly connected to my grand challenge of advancing personalized learning. Every coaching session, I see how children react to the strict industrialized curriculum that our current educational system is built on and how ineffective it is. I coached math 2.5 hours a week in the Spring semester and 1.5 hours a week during a previous semester. I will accumulate a total of 60 hours coaching/tutoring by the time I graduate in Fall 2019. This brings my grand total time for service experiences to be approximately 188 hours.

Being a member in EWB was a great experience for me not because of helping provide clean water to others, but because of working with others that have similar values and desires to help others. I am so grateful to have been able to be a part of a team that works together so passionately to solve a problem. This has led me to believe that a good way to change the education system towards a personalized learning system is to unite teachers and activists together. Its amazing how much more people can accomplish when they are passionate about what they are doing. The greatest lesson I learned was during a weekly team meeting where we all were divided up into small teams of 2 to 3 people. In our small teams we assessed specific characteristics of building a water tower. One group had the shape of it. Another group had the material it was made from. The final group had types of water towers. Each group had to decide which solution was best and why. By the end of the hour meeting, the board of members had some great information to make their selection from. I will always remember this lesson in leading people and having them contribute.

Volunteering as a math coach directly applies to my grand challenge. Being a coach has enlightened me on the daily activities and struggles a typical teacher goes through and how ineffective the current teaching style is. This has increased my desire to advance personalized learning. Coaching has shown me how difficult it is to maintain the attention of a child, but also get them to want to learn when they feel they don’t understand the material. It's especially hard to just get them to stay focused. I have learned much about kids and how the current classroom-based teaching is a highly ineffective method of transferring knowledge to them. I witnessed firsthand the flaws and gaps in the current curriculum-based teaching methods. Many children are adorable because they're off in their own little world which was seen by them moving their hands randomly or starring at the wall. I realized that the children are bored out of their mind at school. This helps me understand why many people in society develop a bitterness towards learning and that will only change if we make learning more personal.

Program Wide Learning Objectives met:

Realistic Vision - Be imaginative in thinking about alternatives to the way things are, while being sensitive to the constraints of the real world.

Service Learning Objectives met:

Community Engagement - Participate in community action, including campus community, neighborhood/city/state community, national community, global community, and others.

Civic Agency - Regard themselves as connected to communities and social groups, and as able to proactively interact with them. Seek ways to make positive change.

Commitment - Appreciate the importance of activism and involvement and dedicate time and energy to them.

Capacity for Reflection - Consider role as social actor, impact on community, and effect of community involvement on self. Seek to strengthen and multiply skills for sustainable social solutions.