The World's Deep Needs Outside the Classroom

Westminster students with Beacon Height Elementary students Great Salt Lake Fall semester 2008

True vocation joins service and self. The deepest vocational question is not "What ought I to do with my life?" It is the more elemental and demanding "Who am I?"
~Palmer Parker

Palmer Parker--writer, teacher, activist, and named as one of the 30 most influential senior leaders in higher education--offers the question How do you find the right work?

Often times leaving the walls of a classroom and entering into community, neighborhoods, and landscapes free of white boards and PowerPoint presentations gives students a deeper glimpse into the world cradling their college experience.





Westminster students partnered with a group of 6th grade students on the shores of the Great Salt Lake for a writing workshop connected with the Common Ground read, which is a book read by all in-coming freshman. This year the book was Refuge, by Terry Tempest Williams.

Both groups benefited from a day spent "outside of the classroom" where the strong smell of salt and deep learning were present.



Conversations about the lake, education, and the writing process, taught all of the students about landscapes of the self.


Vanessa Jordan (middle) a freshman from Arizona, returned to Beacon Heights spring semester 2009 on her own. Even though this service is within a mile of our campus, Vanessa's reasons for returning are large:

• She is observing children for fieldwork in her psychology class
  
• She is also enrolled in a service-learning class
• She wants to help meet the needs of a classroom of all-day kindergartners

"Vanessa helps me with my math and my take-aways. She helps me learn about money and pennies. She smiles when she knows I am sad." Willa (kindergartner)

Another kindergartner--Sabine says "Vanessa helps me to build. She gives me contests and helps me know what to do. She makes school exciting."

Perhaps some say bigger things need to happen with service like larger outcomes, more international outreach, and more attention on meeting the needs of at-risk groups. But Vanessa has quietly found a way to meet the deep needs of the world when she exits the college-classroom and enters a classroom filled with possibilities every Tuesday and Thursday morning. She teaches small students how to be engaged, as she herself is engaged at Westminster College. Being out of the classroom, Vanessa has defined who she is by what she is doing.

In her own words, Vanessa writes about her experiences outside the classroom:

I was introduced to the student’s of Beacon Heights Elementary School through a Learning Community fall semester 2008. Coming from out of state, this was a wonderful opportunity for me to feel more connected to Salt Lake City. I began by providing writing aide to a few fifth grade students, for their assignment they were asked to discuss why the Great Salt Lake was important to their community. This opportunity gave me the chance to develop some strong connections with the students and I was impressed by the student’s appreciation for the Great Salt Lake. The fifth graders ability to share their insights with me let me feel a new connection to Salt Lake City. For the first time I began to feel like Salt Lake City was my new home and that I could feel as passionate as the fifth graders about this home.

I decided to come back the next semester to aide the kindergarten classroom. This opportunity was provided from both my Developmental Psychology class and my Service Learning class. I am a Developmental Psychology major and was able to observe and interact with the Kindergarten students. I have noticed that there is something so special about children’s influence on people. These children are extremely bright and welcoming. Everyday I am able to go to the classroom I feel uplifted by their presence. I have realized that being in children’s company is something that I feel I would like to do in my career. From the Kindergartner’s I have learned just how simple it is to feel happy and I have found that their happiness stays with me throughout the day.

Fredrick Buechner defines vocation as the place where your "deep gladness meets the world's deep needs."
~posted by Leslie Robbins and Vanessa Jordan