Service-Learning in Frederick County

Sections:

2. Fact Sheet

3. Fellows

Contact the designated MSSA Regional Coordinator with questions, or to update information on this page.

1. Service-Learning Contact Information

2. Service-Learning Fact Sheet

Total curricular connected service-learning. Students must complete 7 of the 13 high school curricular connected service-learning experiences courses listed below (elementary and middle school courses don't count towards graduation). There is also a Meritorious Service Program for students who do independent service.

Breakdown:

• High School: Intro to Algebra, Algebra, Geometry, Pre-Calculus, Statistics and Probability, Modern World History, American Studies I and II, Biology, English 9, English 10, 11, Government
• Middle School: Math 6, 7, 8, Science 6, Lang. Arts 6, 7, 8, Social Studies 6, 7, 8
• Elementary: Social Studies 1-5

Reporting: Number of service-learning courses taken is noted on student record system. Districts receiving transfer students from Fred. County need to know that students need 7 courses to satisfy the requirement.

Transfer Policy: Students transferring into Fred. County meet with their guidance counselor and school service-learning coordinator to determine what they need to do to satisfy the requirement (take courses, do independent service, etc.).

3. Teacher Fellows (see overview)

The Veterans Partnership Committee won The Sherry Unger Award for September 2002. In cooperation with the WKMS student government, 8th grade band, 6,7 and 8th grade chorus, and life skills classes, the Committee planned and implemented a program honoring veterans in observance of Veterans Day 2001.

Lisa Bruck, 1999, Catoctin High School (Astronomy, Earth Science), lbruck7@yahoo.com

I work with students to maintain a mitigation site and create an outdoor classroom where elementary children are exposed to and trained in environmental science by 9th grade students.

Lisa Catania, 1995, Thurmont Middle School (on leave)

I coordinate the meritorious service-learning activities at Thurmont Middle. This includes advertising service opportunities, training and preparing students for their service, and record keeping. I also teach the required 6th grade Integrated Studies class. Service is infused into the curriculum of this course which includes math, science, social studies, and language arts. The purpose of the course is to introduce students to service and "turn them on" to it. The service project revolves around the story "A Christmas Carol" and the theme of poverty. Students help single mothers by providing supplies for their babies, thus performing service and learning the negative consequences of teen pregnancy.

Candace Desonier, 2001, Thurmont Middle School, 240-236-5100 ext 65155, Candace_Desonier@co.frederick.md.us

Each spring, as a celebration of Earth Day, I sponsor an all-school Eco-Fair which features 5 or more service-learning projects focused on environmental service, awareness, and beautification of school grounds. Some of the projects have included creating a theme garden area with butterflies, Shakespeare, water gardens and a timber-frame arbor, mosaic garden stones, and ornamental trees. Students have also built birdhouses, bird feeders, created "bird seed recipes," and created a cold frame "mini greenhouse." Best practices:

• Our community need was environmental awareness and responsibility and a need to develop pride in our school.
• 6th grade science focuses on water quality and included an integrated unit on metamorphosis (water and butterfly gardens). 7th grade science focuses on environmental studies and endangered environments (such as the Chesapeake Bay). 8th grade fine arts focuses on Shakespeare (thus the Shakespeare garden).
• Journal writing, discussion groups, and problem solving activities were integrated throughout the project.
• Students were responsible for planning the Eco-Fair; they acted as leaders and group coordinators.
• Parents from the community contributed expertise in environmental field as well as extra help. Community organizations were also involved (wildlife rehabilitation, landscape groups, organic farmers, etc.).
• Planning took place in many phases for the fair and for individual projects.
• In preparation, knowledge and skills were gained by having an expert landscaper talk about gardening issues. Students planned the garden as a Renzulli project (involving research) and then they taught others what they had learned.

Amanda Furajter, 2004, Windsor Knolls Middle School, 410-236-5000, amanda.furajter@fcps.org,

Amanda conducts professional development for her schools' staff on service-learning and works closely with the school's Character Counts coordinator and two other Service-Learning Fellows at the school to enhance the schools service-learning program. She also works to ensure that her community understands service-learning and keeps track of students' progress toward the service-learning graduation requirement. Amanda is collaborating with the Character Counts coordinator to introduce the "Start Something" youth program into the school. "Start Something" is a program developed by the Tiger Woods Foundation and the Target Corporation. The purpose of this program is to help young people strive to become persons of character with a strong set of core values by, in part, engaging in service-learning projects.

Joey Hoffman, 1993, joeymom@aol.com, (active Fellow, but retired from school system)

Model Program Coordinator for Service and Literature. Youth RISE advisor for Frederick County.

Margaret Lee, 1999, Oakdale Middle School (Language Arts), 240-236-5575, meg_lee@co.frederick.md.us

As a seventh grade language arts teacher, my student service-learning projects often come directly from something the students have read about people in need. In 1998, my students read a Baltimore Sun article about the plight of an inner-city elementary school which had lost its entire library collection in a flood. Students quickly mobilized and collected more than 7,000 children's books for the school. In 2000, my students organized and carried out a bake sale fundraiser for the Harlem Park Community Organization after reading about the financially threatened summer program for children in that neighborhood. Best practices:

• I have found that middle school students are very passionate in their desire for justice. In situations in which they feel a "wrong" has occurred, they are very quick to try to correct it. Students often approach me with community needs they have heard about and wish to address through a student service-learning project.
• Through their student service-learning projects, my students have used their language arts skills in "real world" applications. From writing a business letter to the principal to request support for the project, to careful reading comprehension to phoning the governor's office, students put their skills to the test in valuable learning situations.
• Students need constant reflection in the course of a large scale project. The reflection piece gives them an opportunity to remain focused and motivated. Sometimes, reflections are journal entries, letters to friends, or drawings. Other times, reflection takes place in the form of a musical selection or even a class circle discussion.
• There is no doubt that facilitating students to complete a service-learning project can sometimes be more effort than simply completing some of the steps myself. Therein lies the real challenge for me as a teacher. I am constantly reminding myself that my role is to guide the students. I tell them up front that the project's success is dependent upon their responsibility for it.
• Through service learning projects, my classes have established partnerships with non-profit agencies, government veterans organizations, community programs, and retail businesses.
• When my students identify a community need, the first thing we do is hold a planning meeting. I make students responsible for producing and following a detailed plan and I serve as a guide and resource for them.
• Service teaming often produces the best opportunities to teach students. They are enthusiastic and eager to learn the skills and factual information needed to carry out their project successfully. I have often found that the most reluctant of learners in typical classroom situations are the ones who truly become engaged and "shine" in service-learning situations.

Alyce O. Luck, 2003, Frederick High School, 240-236-7114, alyce.luck@fcps.org

Our annual Empty Bowls Project lets students learn about and discuss the issue of poverty in our community. Students explore this complex issue and then work to alleviate the problem by raising money through a culminating fund and awareness event. They donate any funds raised to local charities. Best practices:

• Our project addresses the problems of hunger and poverty in our community.
• The project is aligned with our school's Character Counts! Program. The project meets the caring, responsibility, and citizenship pillars of character education. The project also connects to several content areas. For example, students research the issues of hunger and poverty to help prepare and they make the bowls used at the culminating event. We invite each guest to take one of the bowls when they leave as a visual reminder of what they learned at our hunger banquet, the reality that someone somewhere is always looking into an empty bowl because they have nothing to eat.
• Students engage in many discussions throughout the project, such as what social concerns they should address with the funds raised at our event as well as a careful analysis of the success of the event itself. Students are concerned about being equitable and fair to our community non-profits.
• Students take on responsibility for the many tasks they must complete in a timely manner to ensure the event is successful. For example, students make the bowls for the event over a 9 to 10 week period.
• We work with a variety of vendors and merchants on this project.
• This event takes much planning and coordination each year. We invite feeder school choirs to participate, along with their parents. This necessitates good communication and planning with those schools well in advance of the event, etc.
• Students are required to use their research skills to prepare for the event. They must become familiar with community agencies that work to address the issues of poverty. Students also use critical thinking skills as they evaluate the event and decide what they need to improve for future Empty Bowls Banquets.

Beth Ohlsson, 1996, New Market Middle School (retired from school system)

We did a literacy project with four of our local Headstart centers. We began with a story telling performance and the students created follow-up learning games. Next, we created letter and number plays, and made learning games for them. Our third event was an Easter Egg Hunt, in which the children had to match letters to claim the eggs. The eggs were then mounted on a chart to make the alphabet.

Angela Patras, 2003, Thurmont Middle School, 240-236-5100, angela.patras@fcps.org

"Going Grocery Shopping" was created so that the students that need to take the Maryland Functional Math Test (MFMT) could realize that the objectives of the test are problems that the students will have to solve in everyday life. Our seventh grades complete the project at the beginning of the year and it includes problems that pertain to about half of the objectives on the MFMT. Items that are "purchased" by the students are later donated to the Advocates for Homeless Families at the completion of the project. Best practices:

• After I visited the Advocate for Homeless Families office one summer, I realized that they were in need of many items to give to families that could not afford to purchase them on their own. Most of the products that they needed could not be bought with food stamps. I brought this to the attention of the seventh graders at my school and they really wanted to help. These students donated over 400 items to give to the organization. The Advocates for Homeless Families distributed the items to families who were trying to get back on their feet after being homeless.
• While shopping, the students had to spend as close to $50 as possible without going over. They had a worksheet to fill out while finding the items on their shopping list. On the worksheet, students had to record the unit price of the items and how much it would cost for more than one item. They had coupons and sale items that they had to calculate towards the total cost, find the tax, final cost, and make change. All of these topics cover 10 out of the 30 objectives in the MFMT. Many of those topics, in addition to finding the best buy between two items, are also a part of the seventh grade curriculum. Not only did they get a chance to practice solving those types of problems, they were able to practice completing an activity that they will all have to do at some time in their life, grocery shopping. Before the students were even able to enter the "grocery store" that we created, they had to complete other math-related activities that covered curriculum and MFMT objectives. While preparing for the project, the students answered questions about local, state, and national homelessness by reading bar graphs, line graphs, circle graphs, and charts.
• The very first reflection the students did was on the day after I introduced the project. They had to write a journal entry explaining how they would feel and what they would do if they were on their own (no parents) and homeless. In addition, at the end of every class we reviewed what we learned in class and had an open discussion. On the last day of the project, the students wrote a reflection journal explaining how they felt about the project and how they felt about helping the homeless. After reading the reflections, I saw that many of the students realized how lucky they were.
• The students worked in groups throughout the whole project. The groups were made aware of the work that they had to do. From there, the groups were responsible for getting the work done and for turning it in on time. The students were also graded on the accuracy of the worksheet that they completed while in the "grocery store," so they were responsible for taking the time to fill it our correctly.
• The school created a partnership with the Advocates for Homeless Families organization. We helped them by donating needed items, and they helped us by sending a member of their organization to talk with the students. I hope that every year we do this project that we can work with the Advocates for Homeless Families.
• I spent months planning for this project. After spending time working out the kinks in the outline, I spent many hours on the internet looking for information on homelessness in the United States, in Maryland, and in Frederick County. Then I spent many hours on the phone finalizing plans with the Advocates for Homeless Families. Finally, I spent a few weeks before the project began coordinating the project with another seventh grade math teacher. We wanted to make sure that we were doing the same activities on the same days and that all of the projects' accessories were perfectly constructed. It also took us a few days to construct our "grocery store" in one of the empty classrooms.
• One of the main skills that the students learned throughout this project was teamwork. This is because they worked in predetermined teams during the whole project. They also enhanced many of the math skills that they were taught over the years. This included adding and multiplying decimals. Some of the new math skills that they learned through this project were finding the percentage of a number and how to find the best buy. This project helped many students be successful on the MFMT. In addition, as noted above, students learned about homelessness and how to help agencies address this problem in their community.

Stacey Sisler, 2002, Windsor Knolls Middle School, 240-236-5000

Three hundred and fifty 7th graders at Windsor Knolls Middle School participated in a walk-a-thon that raised approximately $16,000 for the Lindsey Learning Center and Bread of Life Soup Kitchen of the Frederick Rescue Mission, an organization in Frederick County that helps people who are homeless and in need. Through their curricular classes, students learned about homelessness, planning a fundraiser, and used other skills that made the walk-a-thon a huge success. Best practices:

• The Frederick Rescue Mission had a need to raise their budget for the next fiscal year and they were focusing their efforts on the budget for the Lindsey Learning Center and the Bread of Life Soup Kitchen. The Lindsey Learning Center provides education skills and opportunities for people in Frederick who need to improve their skills before they can find a job that will provide enough for them. The Soup Kitchen serves those in need and hungry in Frederick. By helping to provide a budget for these services, they can continue to exist and help the citizens of Frederick. Our walk-a-thon met that need by raising funds through Help the Homeless and a matching grant associated with the fundraising effort.
• Students used skills from many of their curricular classes. They used reading and writing skills to read information about homelessness, to write press releases for the media invited to report on the walk-a-thon, and to write reflections about their experiences throughout the fundraising. They used math skills to calculate an estimate of the funds raised, to graph the progress of the fundraising, and to reflect on the amount of money raised compared to the amount of effort they had to put into the service project. They also studied various aspects of homelessness in their science, health, and social studies classes. The students even designed and learned the walking route in their gym classes.
• Students reflected on this experience in a number of different ways. They wrote about the problem of homelessness, they predicted costs for running such services as their walk-a-thon was going to benefit, and they calculated and discussed the ease of the project compared to the amount of money they raised. They also held class discussions after reading a short story about homelessness, and many other types of reflection activities.
• As part of the planning process for the walk-a-thon, there were students who volunteered to be part of a student leadership committee. They were responsible for greeting and escorting guests at a kick-off assembly, for participating as speakers and encouragers at the assembly, for creating and leading committees to help in various organizational parts of the walk, and to greet and escort guests on the day of the walk. Community Partnerships: A partnership was created with the Frederick Rescue Mission through their contact with us in helping to make the walk-a-thon a success.
• The seventh grade team of teachers, planned how we envisioned the walk-a-thon would develop in the different curricular areas. We also considered the idea for the kick-off assembly and for making sure there would be student leaders in the project. All the 7th graders were given a lesson in SSL101. Logistic plans were also made for the day of the walk.
• Students were taught about service learning to begin the project. They were also given a knowledge base about homelessness and about the Frederick Rescue Mission. They reinforced skills they have from other classes through the activities they did leading up to and including the walk-a-thon.