Service Hours for BHS

For many schools, the students face the question of "how am I going to get my service hours in?". Service hours required for high school graduation is a ridiculous idea.  By forcing someone to do something, you are making it less valuable. That said, there would be some positives overall.  According to Melissa Fenton, having required service hours lessens the potential for students to provide community service later in life (Melissa Fenton, Grownandflown.com, 2019).

The idea of community service hours at first glance seems like a great thing to do, but when further thought is put into the equation, the more ridiculous it seems.  Melissa Fenton (Melissa Fenton, grownandflown, 2019) again states that by requiring service hours for graduation, you are exposing children to proper workplaces as well as opening further possibilities to expand on social networking.  In addition, students may find themselves gaining a sense of civic responsibility, which in turn might affect their studies and how well they do in school.  With all the positive influences on the students, for what reason would mandating service hours be a bad thing?

The easiest way to state the flaws of mandating of service would be that mandatory service hours itself is an oxymoron. Claire Koenig (Claire Koenig, silverchips.mbhs.edu, 2011) states that by enforcing hours, you are making the hours valueless. How must universities and colleges distinguish who deserves a spot if they cannot tell someone wanted to help out in the community and someone who had to serve their community. Sara Helms (Sara Helms, Science Direct, 2013) found that mandatory volunteer hours in high school led to a loss in long term volunteering. This means that not only is it less valuable to the colleges who are selecting the hopeful students, but it also has no value in the eyes of the person since it was not their idea.  Not only does the idea of mandatory seem unreasonable, but problematic too.