Wednesday, May 7, 2008
Update on defining the public good
To start class today, please update me and the rest of class on your ideas for our current writing assignment. Tell us about the question you’re exploring in relation to the public good. Why do you want to explore this topic? What do you hope to learn by answering this question? What questions or concerns do you have about this project at this point?
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For our current project on defining the public good i am planning on defining the public good in respect to democracy. More specifically, i intend to examine how the public good its and implementation relates to the development of the democratic american or the "citizen". In order to complete this task i am going to have to find sources that deal directly with democracy and service learning or volunteering. I believe that there is a clear and distinct relationship between public good and ones duty as an American citizen. By answering this question i want to learn what our role in society is as Americans.
In my quest to define the public good, I plan to analyzing two of the philosophers’ arguments that we have/will read in class. One being Aristotle and the other is John Stuart Mill. I also plan on reviewing Kant’s duty theory, and possibly even David Hume. I hope to evaluate each claim and examples and then formulate my own definition of the public good. This topic is interesting to me because I like taking pieces of others’ theories and using them to create my own opinions or philosophies.
So far, I see particular difficulty in applying Aristotle’s personal moral good to the community. Though, digging further into others’ writings, I may find that personal goodness acts as a large part of public goodness.
For our current writing assignment the question I am exploring in relation to the public good has to do with student’s motivation to participate in public good projects. These projects could involve such things as volunteering for an organization (i.e. Project Angel Heart), or even giving your time for something that may focus more on your own community. I want to see if students feel obligated to volunteer or if they truly do it for own self-satisfaction. I’m sure I will find students who lean both ways on this question but I want to find out what proportion of students feel one way or the other. I want to explore this question because I feel that I am kind of both myself. At first I will feel like this is an obligation and I am giving up my time for something I may not want to be doing. After the shift is over I always feel good about myself and that this was possibly not the waste of time I had made it out to be. What I hope to learn from this question and my paper is how other students feel about volunteering. It’s something I am really just curious about and I hope I am able to explore deeper into this question as my paper develops.
I think I would like to write my research paper about student's experiences within the DU community with service learning. I am thinking of gathering experiences qualitatively of different students doing service learning projects through different programs on campus. I could gather interviews through this class, Sarah Pesson's class, as well as interview people from my living and learning community because we are all required to do community service work. It would be interesting to me to find out what other people think of their service learning experiences, the good and the bad, maybe how it has effected them or how it hasn't. I think I might collaborate with Laura and she would also conduct a survey to gather quantitative data about service learning experiences, so we could include both types of research into our papers. Time is a concern, being able to find the time to gather all of the interviews and data in time to begin the writing process.
For my next writing assignment, I am going to talk about youth voting in relationship to the public good. I want to explore this topic because I believe that having a strong youth turnout in elections is very important to the public good. With this next Presidential election coming up I think it is very important for the youth to be voting. The youth of today is the future for America tomorrow. In three more years we will be entering the work force making America everything that it represents. I’m not sure specifically yet what exactly I will be talking about and what direct connection I will be making yet regarding the public good, but my general idea has to do something with youth voting. I hope to learn what influences youth to vote and how much of the total votes are coming from youth. I want to find out what youth think about if their vote really matters. I don’t have any question yet about this project, but I haven’t started researching anything yet either.
Although I do not have a clear agenda for my topic or the connections that going to be made in relation to the public good, I'm set on the topic of social capital.I want to explore this issue because it is a factor that works behind the scene with many topics. Whether its crime, poverty, or in this case the public good, social capital is a trait that is extremely flexible. With social capital i want to talk about the effects it has on the public good, how it can increase the public good along with productivity and awareness.
It is a question that is relevant. It is an issue. What good does forced community service / civic engagement really do? Is it mutually beneficial to both parties? Does a student volunteer offer the same amount of benefits to those in need as adults who are willing volunteers?
It has been my experience that students often say, “I have to volunteer,” when referring to their civic engagement. I would say that such an attitude does add a stigma to community service, that it prevents both parties from reaping all of the benefits.
But on the other hand, in relation to The Nicomachean Effects, maybe forced civic engagement does instill a sense of habit into the student. Perhaps it instills a sense of duty to the art of service. I plan on doing research and conducting interviews to better refine my thoughts and see exactly where the student body’s thoughts lie…
For this research project, I would like to explore the service-learning program on campus and the breadth of the student involvement in it. I want to find out some of these statistics on the program in order to see how this involvement is related to the university code being dedicated to the public good. I would like to compare the student involvement in the service-learning program to national averages if I can find them in order to see how effective the dedication to the public good by the university is and if DU actually has a commitment to the public good in a way that can be measured by service learning involvement. If I cannot find such national statistics, I will use only the survey I will be conducting instead of both in conjunction. The survey will be asking undergraduate students in service-learning and non service-learning classes about their involvement in and their knowledge of the service-learning program at DU. I would also like to interview the director of the service-learning program to see what kind of information he has. I want to measure the growth of the program as well and compare to when the dedication to the public good was instated.
In doing this project, I want to see how effective service-learning is in a college setting. I would also like to see how the expansion of the program has impacted the public good. I would like to find out if DU dedicating itself to the public good has actually made a difference in the dedication to the public good.
For this writing assignment, Megan and I will be focusing on the service experiences of students at DU. We hope to interview a variety of students, including some in the other service learning class and others that are a part of the social justice learning living community. With the variety in students we hope to grasp the true experiences of doing service on this campus. To supplement the qualitative research, we will use surveys about service learning experience to gain quantitative data. These surveys will also help to show the different qualities of service learning among different students, and different meaning that the service had among different students. By focusing on the experiences of service learning, I think it will be a new perspective on if service learning is really working.
I am still unsure of the exact direction of my final paper. I am intrigued by the concept of selfless service (or lack thereof). Can service to others truly be selfless? Or does this even matter? I hope to integrate an exploration of this idea into my paper, but I am unsure of how to do this. I am considering using our class blogs as a primary source, looking to the reflections of our class in terms of personal and civic growth. Obviously, our service this quarter has been mandatory, but one’s outlook on the experience may take many different forms. What was expected going into this experience? What was gained at a personal level? At a civic level? This research would be based on solely qualitative data, leaving it very abstract and open-ended. This may even turn into more of a philosophical analysis. I am not sure yet, but I will continue to struggle with these thoughts.
I had a wonderful experience interviewing Bob, a volunteer at Project Angel Heart. I have always been interested in other people's experience in public good and volunteering. After, Monday's class I realized that our next writing assignment will give me another opportunity to interview people who have also volunteered.
Keren and I are going to work together on the assignment together. We were post partners, volunteered with Project Angel Heart's Dining out for life, and interviewed Bob together. In our assignment we are going to use Qualitative and Quantitative research. We will be interviewing 3 students from D.U. who are required to volunteer at Project Homeless Connect. We will be exploring the importance of service learning/volunteering. Furthermore, we will analyze D.U.'s expectations regarding service learning. Our main objective is to figure out whether service learning is a good thing and whether or not it should be required.
My study involves analyzing the philosophies of Aristotle, John Stuart Mill, and Kant. Along my search I may find other sources that I want to briefly include. My research is mainly involved with the philosophies and then applying them to the public good. I know some are more on an individual level such as Aristotle and Kant. With these two, I may have to extrapolate general claims from their works and construct an argument of how these claims apply to the community as a whole. Also, I may find that I want to use one philosophy as a main claim and compare the others to it.
There are some limitations to interpreting texts. One is that, each philosophy represents one man’s particular opinion. I’m not looking at statistical data that might represent the main population. This might limit my philosophy that I construct at the end of the research because it will be simply based on three or so others personal theories. I’m hoping to read different philosophies while keeping my mind open to how I want to define the public good.
Michelle and I are currently planning on interviewing three students that are participating in Project Homeless Connect. We wish to find out why they are participating, what they gained out of the experience, and whether they think service learning should be required at DU (and other schools). So, our general question at hand will be "Should service learning be a required part of school?" We want to explore this topic, because we want to get some answers! We have talked about the issue a lot, and can't come up with an idea. We want to get others' perspectives and create a discussion paragraph analyzing them. The questions I have, are just about the clarity of our direction. I feel like we have a general idea of what we want to accomplish, but need more structure.
For his writing assignment, I plan on studying the motivations behind public service, I especially want to look at the individual versus the collective good. If the individual's intentions are not to contribute to the public good yet he still volunteers, is he still contributing to the public good? I think yes, but I would like to look at the differences in the situation. In general, I will look at the different reasons people get involved in community service and the resulting effects.
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