Talking Points #5: Kahne and Westheimer: In the Service of What?

Kahne and Westheimer: In the Service of What?
Christina DiPalma

Quotes:
1. “Just as the difference between change and charity may provide an important conceptual distinction for those analyzing service learning curricula, it is helpful to distinguish the moral, political, and intellectual goals that motivate those who support service learning.”(page 5)

This quote stood out to me because although the words change and charity may seem similar, they really are not. I realized that change morally is caring about a certain service learning goal where as charity is giving, which is really not caring and putting time into the goal. Politically, charity is a civic duty whereas change is a social reconstruction where they are trying to fix things because they care about it. After reading that quote I look at this differently because if I believe in a certain goal then I would want to change it instead of charity because caring is more important and it means more than giving and not getting involved physically.Intellectually change is an experience that people who give to charity will not be able has a warm heartfelt experience that changes someone’s life.

2. “Educators who emphasize change would clearly also value the educational benefits of this approach. To tap into the full power of service activities, however, these practitioners would want to combine critical inquiry with action.”

Teachers who really talk about change should value the educational benefits. I feel that they should bring change into their lessons because I feel that if they are passionate about teaching, then they will do it. They will do it because they care and they will take action into what they do and I feel that caring is more important than giving; it’s the experience and or activities that make it worthwhile. When I am a teacher, activities that I prepare will be about change/caring and it will be all about wanting to do something and not giving.


3.“The experiential and interpersonal components of service learning activities can achieve the first crucial step toward diminishing the sense of “otherness”, that often separates students-particularly privileged students-from those in need. In doing so, the potential to develop caring relationships created.”

With this quote you start to see that a relationship about caring has been created with you and the “other”. It does not matter what or where each of you came from because everyone is different and what really matters is for everyone to get along. We are all human beings, we are not perfect and it should not matter what we are but who we are. Being separated into privileged and not privilege is unfair because we are all equal as being humans. Sometimes I wonder how all of this got started because it is not a good feeling putting someone down.



Questions/Comments/Points to Share

Overall I found this to be very interesting but not one of my favorites. Although it states good points between change and charity, I feel that plays a big roll into things that people do. I never really looked at change and charity as change being about caring and charity being about giving. It opened my eyes to see that when people give it really does not mean they are in the experience of changing a certain goal which now I know that the people who are about change, are the people who care. Other stuff this article talks about is that the relationships created from caring from the “otherness”. I have noticed that every reading that we have had connects to each other in one way or another and it is always nice to see what different people say about certain situations. One question I would like to know is where all of the “otherness” came from and judging people based on what they are instead of the person they are.