Do Service? Learn First!
In the United States today, students do not go to university without experiencing some form of community service. From a pedagogical perspective, service learning connects students and universities to the community around them as well as to the general society, and students learn “the values of community and social responsibility” (Neururer & Rhoads qtd. in Mitchell 50). Therefore, the integration of community service with educational institutions benefits both students and the community they live in. However, collaboration across different social groups is often limited by the differences between them such as educational background, race, or social class in general. Moreover, differences not only exist between the students and the community today — the student body itself has become more diversified. Among all American postsecondary institutions, the percentage of white students dropped from 84 percent in 1976 to 60 percent in 2012; the proportion of students over twenty-five years old saw a 35 percent increase from 2000 to 2012 (National Center for Education Statistics qtd. in Mitchell and Donahue 459). As an international student from mainland China myself, it’s easy for me to notice students from different social backgrounds in my classes. Diverse backgrounds means divergent experiences and different levels of comfort when it comes to service learning. Focusing on the body of international students, I argue that oftentimes they would encounter difficulties that other people find hard to imagine at the starting stage of service engagement; therefore, they should put more emphasis on the “learning” aspect of service learning through communications with community partners and their American counterparts, instead of coming in with the expectation of having meaningful contributions.
To better understand the specific difficulties international students face, it’s beneficial to examine the complexities in service learning first. The most important thing to note is that community service is not merely about doing “charity” work such as giving out food or distributing water to those in need. In “Traditional vs. Critical Service-Learning”, Tania Mitchell points out that in real, impactful service learning, students and community members actually take on a larger role and aim at a more ambitious goal. She states that this goal “is to deconstruct systems of power so the need for service and the inequalities that create and sustain them are dismantled” (Mitchell 50). In other words, Mitchell believes that service learning is to eliminate or improve the community’s dilemma by examining and exposing the power structures behind all the social inequalities that made it possible. Therefore, in order to really improve the lives of our community partners, we must learn to move our eyes away from the immediate needs of the community and discard the “resource-giving” mindset. Instead, we should focus on hearing the voices from the community and redistributing the power that was taken away from them. However, how we can let community members speak and how we can approach the redistribution of power become the real problems.
One possible way to solve these problems is to create authentic relationships with community partners, but it comes with more complexities. Mitchell, again in “Traditional vs. Critical Service-Learning”, quotes Koliba, O’Meara, and Seidel to highlight the importance of developing authentic relationships both “to the learning process and to working toward social justice” (qtd. in Mitchell 58). Nevertheless, she also quotes Collins to call attention to the fact that the usual connections we make across differences “are squarely rooted in relations of domination and subordination” instead of being “different but equal” (qtd. in Mitchell 58). A clear example could be the relationship between younger students’ and their teachers as there are usually large gaps in age, educational background, and life experience in general; as a result of these differences, it’s hard to see teachers who could resist the convenience of taking up the position of the ruler when it comes to teaching. Another example would be the numerous instances of police violence towards African Americans, in which the relationships between the victims and the police officers are clearly based on the racial prejudices and patterns of domination and subordination rooted in American society. This way of relating prevents people from communicating their needs and collaborating with each other. Although I believe that there are ways to consciously force and train ourselves to develop equal relationships, such as growing our empathy and seeing our differences as merely categories, people could find it difficult to even start a relationship if the two parties have never interacted with each other before. This is part of the reason international students often find community engagement especially daunting.
This is not to say that American students would find the relation-developing process easy and painless. Take the community I am working with as an example: this community, the Francisco Homes, is a non-profit organization in LA that provides temporary “homes” for formerly incarcerated people to help them reintegrate back into the community. Most of these residents were “lifers” at prisons, meaning that they once received a life sentence and had often spent decades in prison before they got out with parole. Last month, I went to their “Welcome Home Ceremony”, a gathering held for newly released individuals coming to live at the Francisco Homes. I saw that these people were at least middle-aged and at most 70-years-old, and they seemed silent and even frustrated although they had left prison. Indeed, life often does not treat them better outside. In the “Q&A with Sister Teresa” part of the 2021 Francisco Homes Newsletter, Sister Teresa, the executive director of the Francisco Homes, pointed out a distressing fact about the lifers who couldn’t leave prison earlier than 2008, when California started to reduce its prison population through criminal justice reforms. She said, “before 2008 to 2009, No lifer was getting out of prison. And if they were, it was only because they were privileged enough to have family” (Wu 34). In other words, the lifers who remain incarcerated for the longest are often those who lack the support of a family. Committing their crimes in their young ages was likely a result of the environment they grew up in as well.
Compared with these individuals, students at USC are often young, supported by a well-off family, getting a prestigious college education, not formerly incarcerated; most importantly, we have time, energy, and future possibilities. We and they are in contrasting positions of any thinkable social spectrum, which makes it difficult for us to connect with each other in the first place, not to mention to avoid patterns of domination and establish equal and authentic relations.
However, Sister Teresa found the process of relating to these “former lifers” especially rewarding and called it “a tremendous experience of that hidden aspect of humanity”, which most people refuse to believe that these individuals possess (Wu 34). Although most American students don’t have the same experiences and standings as Sister Teresa’s, this idea is still encouraging, and many will try to connect with the Francisco Homes residents. While this approach might be achievable for American students, who at least share a similar cultural background with the residents, it is much harder in reality for international students if they strive for the same level of engagement.
There are extra challenges for international students to connect with their community partners and to investigate the roots of social inequality because of the culture barriers existing between them. The difficulty in conversations is often the most evident. If the Francisco Homes residents describe their experiences of childhood or prison to American students, the students will be able to understand even though they probably didn’t have similar experiences; but if the listeners were international students, they most likely couldn’t even imagine any of the details, settings, or social conditions because they are simply unfamiliar with the symbolic system. In other words, when the culture, language, history, and values are not shared or understood between both parties of a conversation, deeper conversations cannot take place, and deeper connections cannot be made. In addition, not all international students come in as fluent English-speakers. They often have less confidence in communicating with Americans, so they would be less likely to open up and talk to community partners. This further reduces their motivation of service and limits the impact of their engagement.
A byproduct of the cultural differences is people’s awareness of their social identities, which could also affect international students’ willingness to contribute to community service in general. International students can hardly identify with any American social group due to the differences in language, life style, and values. As a Chinese international student, I would not say I have much in common with my American classmates or the Francisco Homes residents. To be honest, the direct consequence of my alienness to America is that I would not care as much about my community partners as I do about “my own people”. This mindset could heavily influence a student’s participation in community engagement events and limit their ability to cause changes.
Sadly, because of the cultural differences and language barriers, international students can expect neither meaningful social impact nor authentic relationships at a beginning period of community service. Although American students also have to put in efforts to connect with community partners and cause changes, it will likely take them a much shorter time. If immediate success is not possible, what should international students expect?
I would argue that service “learning” is the single thing that international students should focus on at the starting stage of community engagement. In other words, they should try to learn more and be less anxious about contributing to community service. This involves a change in mindset, and the core of this change is communication. They should try to have conversations with their community partners, just to get to know them as individuals and understand how they interact with people; they should also have more conversations with their fellow American students in community service, and more ideally, get involved into conversations between American students and the community partners, so that they can observe and learn about all of these people through their interactions. This works the other way around as well: when international students don’t feel pressured to keep up with the pace of their American counterparts, other people can learn about them, and genuine connections can be formed. Although the process will be long, communication will allow us to achieve mutual understanding, and meaningful social change could take place under the collaboration of the students and the community members.
Works Cited
Mitchell, Tania D. “Traditional vs. Critical Service-Learning: Engaging the Literature to Differentiate Two Models.” Michigan Journal of Community Service Learning, 2008, pp.50–58.
Mitchell, Tania D., and David M. Donahue. “Ideal and Real in Service Learning.” The Cambridge Handbook of Service Learning and Community Engagement, 2017, p. 459.
Wu, Sherman. “Q&A with Sister Teresa.” Francisco Homes Newsletter, A Return to Normal, 2021, pp.34–35.
