Curriculum

Service

Community service is one of the foundations of the honors experience. It is designed to benefit the overall educational experience by making students aware of issues that exist in the real world and to show connections between what is being learned in the classroom and the world beyond college. Community service also provides the opportunity for students to participate in shaping the lives and experiences of others.  

All honors students are required to complete 50 hours of community service before they graduate. For most students, those hours will be completed over four years. Students in the pharmacy program have six years to complete the community service requirement. Students graduating early will need to complete the requirement before graduation.

Honors Student Association Alternative Spring Break, New Orleans (2020)

Alternative Spring Break

Alternative Spring Break

Alternative Spring Break

Types of Service  

For students' efforts to count, they must usually be performed without some expectation of benefit to the student, beyond the learning and engagement opportunities presented. While students may receive tokens of appreciation (a provided meal, a free shirt, drinks while working), any other type of compensation is normally not allowed. Exceptions are made for programs like  AmeriCorps, which does allow earning of scholarship dollars, or volunteering for a place where students may have received a scholarship. However, direct pay, upgrades in services (for example, receiving an upgraded parking pass), or other types of non-monetary but tangible benefits will not be counted as service.  

Categories of Service

Volunteering

At its core, volunteering is about giving of yourself. You dedicate your time and your skills to others, without expectation of receiving anything in return. The point of volunteering is to help an organization or an individual accomplish something they might not be able to do otherwise, or that allows them to dedicate limited resources to other activities. 

Basic principles of volunteering:

• Volunteering is about giving in some way
• It benefits the chosen organization in some way
• Volunteering also benefits the individual, especially if they are able to learn new skills, support a cause or organization important to them and make connections with others
• Volunteer work is always unpaid
• Volunteering always respects the rights, dignity and cultures of others
• Volunteering is not a substitution for paid work and should not be used to replace the paid work of others
• While each situation may be different, most volunteering is about providing a skill or a service directly to an organization or individual 
• Volunteer work is usually done for nonprofit organizations, although it may be organized by businesses or for-profit groups
• Volunteering is always a matter of choice and should be voluntary, including who is supported through volunteer hours 

Philanthropic Service

Many people equate philanthropy with giving, especially with giving money. Through that giving, people can support organizations whose goals include promoting the common good and improving the quality of life. In this way, philanthropy and philanthropic organizations support numerous causes, from environmentalism to political causes, to specific regions, countries and cultures.

Philanthropy is an important part of the overall American service tradition. The act of giving—usually money, but sometimes goods or services—is noble. However, it is not the same as giving time and effort.

In honors, we encourage giving, but simply giving “things” cannot be counted as service. Students may, however, choose to give of their time to support philanthropic efforts. For example, volunteering at an event that is designed to raise money for a cause can count as philanthropic service, because the student is actively involved. However, simply donating $50 to the event, or running in a 5K race to raise money will not count. 

Broadly speaking, philanthropy involves raising money or goods to support a charitable cause. Philanthropic service is actually volunteering your time to that charitable cause.

Service Learning

Service learning is a combination of two important concepts: volunteering and learning. In a service-learning situation, equal focus is on the service being provided to the organization or individual and to the learning that is achieved by the volunteer.

Students engage in service learning over a longer time period (as part of a semester-long class, or an ongoing relationship with an organization) and care is taken to link the volunteer work being done to the learning outcomes of the class or experience. 

This is often achieved by volunteers engaging in meaningful reflection about the service provided. Volunteers may journal, engage in ongoing discussions, or create projects that reflect their learning. For reflection to be meaningful, it must engage in some deeper thought than just what tasks were completed and why it was important. Reflection causes students to think about their role, the organization’s role and the importance of others in the service provided. It is willing to engage in analysis, critique and process improvement, rather than just reiterating what was completed. The overall outcome of service learning is to provide a real-world outlet for skills and concepts learned in a classroom setting.

Service Limitations and Cautions

All honors students are encouraged to engage with their communities in ways that are meaningful to them. However, for the purposes of the honors service requirement, there are some limitations to what can be counted.

• Limits on SIUE Participation
  • Most community service should be done off campus to fully engage in the spirit and benefit of service. Activities that serve the entire campus community (see examples under Service Opportunities) or that are coordinated by the University but take place in non-University settings can count toward the honors requirement. Other campus activities linked to organizations or offices generally will not count as service hours. In most cases, note taking for classes will also not count, unless you are not enrolled in the class. Other examples include working Preview SIUE tables for other offices, working as a campus tour guide, or any campus role that provides a payment or benefit. If you have questions about whether an on-campus activity will count, you can submit your question to the assistant director.
• Service to Honors 
  • Because we rely on student voice in our recruitment and programmatic activities, you can complete up to 10 hours of your requirement through volunteering activities with honors, including things like admission events, summer orientation, and Meridian Interview Day activities. Specific guidelines will be provided when hours can count.
• Religious Engagement
  • SIUE adheres to CNCS AmeriCorps guidelines that prohibit service hours to religious institutions where the direct service involves conducting worship services, providing instruction as part of a program that includes mandatory religious instruction or worship, constructing or operating facilities devoted to religious instruction or worship, maintaining facilities primarily or inherently devoted to religious instruction or worship, or engaging in any form of religious proselytization. Building a church may not count as service, but helping at a food bank that is open to the public (but affiliated with a religious institution) may meet the requirement.

Service Opportunities

•  Honors Alternative Spring Break/Alternative Summer Beginnings (ASB)  
  • The Honors ASB allows students to engage in a week-long volunteer activity during traditional break times (either spring break or at the end of the spring term). Each year, the Honors ASB sponsors a trip to a different location, where students can engage in service to a variety of communities. In past trips to New Orleans, students have helped with housing rehabilitation, community gardens and organizations serving persons with disabilities. In addition to service, participants participate in reflection activities and take advantage of cultural opportunities in the area.
• HSA Service Committee
  • The Honors Service Committee plans volunteer opportunities for students throughout the academic year. All honors students are required to have 50 service hours before they graduate. The goal of this committee is to make attaining service hours easier for students. The committee has done events with food pantries, cleaning up walking paths and online research, and is always looking for new and interesting ways for students to volunteer. The committee and its activities are open to all honors students.

• HSA Community Garden  
  • The Community Garden is a new project for honors students. Planning is currently underway for our first crop to be planted on campus this spring. We are focused on using sustainable methods to grow nutritious food. Produce from the Community Garden will be donated to campus food scarcity resources. Students will have the opportunity to get outside, learn new skills and give back to their community.
• Successful Communities Collaborative  
  • The Successful Communities Collaborative is a program that integrates graduate, professional and advanced undergraduate students into the program to implement change with partner cities by enrolling in specific related courses. The one-year partnership could engage 10-15 courses spanning 10+ academic departments. Projects may include engineering, urban design, planning, cost-benefit analysis, economic development, legal and policy analysis, community engagement, and marketing or public relations campaigns.  
• Kimmel Service Saturdays  
  • Service Saturday provides site coordination and transportation to students seeking service opportunities. Students can complete service projects dealing with homelessness, poverty, animal rights and welfare, food insecurity, environmental sustainability and home repair.  
• Campus Food Scarcity  
  • The Cougar Cupboard serves students, staff and faculty with emergent food issues. The Cougar Cupboard provides three days of food for visitors, has resources for additional food insecurities and is conveniently located in the Morris University Center. The Food Recovery Network is a student powered initiative centered on food sustainability. Students have the opportunity to craft meals with food recovered from campus and community partners to be donated to community agencies that distribute food to their clients!  

Additional community service opportunities are available through the Kimmel Student Involvement Center. 

Service on Your Own 

In addition to any campus-based opportunities for service and volunteering, students can create their own service opportunities in the Edwardsville/Glen Carbon area or in their own hometown. These opportunities must adhere to the Service Guidelines and must be reported in the Honors Service portal.      

Reporting Service Hours 

In order to be counted, service hours must be reported through the Honors Service portal. Students may use hours earned with another organization or class to meet honors service requirements. However, for hours to count, they must be submitted to honors directly. 

Other Items to Note

• Honors hours are reviewed separately from any other University requirements. Just because hours are accepted by another organization does not mean they will be accepted by honors, or vice versa. 
• Completion of the entire electronic form is required for hours to be considered. Failure to complete the form, especially engaging in some meaningful descriptions where requested, may cause the service to be discounted or the form returned for correction.
• Submitting the form does not indicate automatic approval. If there are any concerns, students will be contacted directly. 
• For single-occasion events (one-day activity, one week on Alternative Spring Break, etc.), hours should be submitted within three weeks. Hours submitted after that time may not be considered. Once a semester ends, no submissions will be reviewed further.
• For ongoing events, hours should be submitted at the end of the activity.  
• For summer events, hours should be submitted by August 1.