"The hard labor and work of many families gave food to the homeless for another night"
Explanation:
The service hours that I obtained were from helping the homeless by serving at André House. During my service I helped out at the soup kitchen, clothing closet, and the food prep/food service area. It was a great experience that thought me of how grateful I should be for the things I have and how lucky I am to be in the economic stats that I am in.
On October eleventh Jared, Ryan, Eric, Tyler and myself went down to Andre House to get what was my first taste of helping the homeless and being at Andre house. Once I got there, I viewed the enormous complex and saw how devoted these people were. There were so many things to aid homeless people like food, medicine, clothing, showers, bathrooms, ect, at this amazing shelter. On our first time there we started off right away at making bread with butter for the homeless people. I was amazed by how much food they were going to receive and how much was being made. We then had the hard duty of cleaning the bathrooms, which was surprisingly not that dirty. After doing that dirty work, I volunteered to clean the dishes with Tyler. It was a hard task but it made the day fly by. Once we were all done, we cleaned up and were done for the day.
The second time we came to André House it was for a quick two hours working in the basement. The basement was probably bigger than the normal floor. The basement acted like a storage room for all the clothing, food, and medicine to go. It was enormous. Julian and I spent the two hours there sorting out shoes and finding the shoe numbers of each shoe. It surprised me of the amount of clothing and shoes donated to this shelter.
On the last day of our total ten hour volunteer service, Jared, Tyler, Julian, and I all went on Thanksgiving Day to help André House for four hours. This time we started by preparing Turkey soup for the homeless people by separating the bones from the meat on five turkeys. After that task was done, Jared and I got ready to clean the dishes. Once the people came to eat, we were off to work, dishes kept on pilling in and we kept on cleaning. It was a very wet and fast job but someone had to do it. In the end, André House was an overall exquisite experience that I will never forget.
On the way to Andre House!
Summative on Civic Duty
Civic Duty - the social force that binds you to the courses of action demanded by that force; "we must instill a sense of duty in our children"; "every right implies a responsibility; every opportunity, an obligation; every possession, a duty"- John D.Rockefeller Jr (Farlex) Civic duties to most people is seen as something like voting for the next president in the primaries or voting for your next state legislator, but in fact it is very more broad than this. Civic duties are any actions that aid society, some examples would be from the most simplest like helping an old lady cross the street, or finding someone’s wallet and returning it to them, to the most extreme like volunteering for the military or volunteering to help a candidate campaign.
The civic duty of the American citizen is vital in the evolution and positive outcome of our society. Imagine if a society had no civic duty, a place where if you turned your back for but a second someone would steal your wallet, a place where no one received aid or help and everyone was in a battle against each other. This type of society would be unheard of and would fall immediately, that is why civic duty is so vital. Civic duty makes our society move forward and makes it into a more positive and more superior culture. With the freedom that we are given as Americans, we must give back to the society in ways like community service for example.
What about the time and effort that takes place doing a civic duty? Most people would say this is why they do not perform such acts. (Citizen) These are just excuses for ignorant people not wanting to give a helping hand to their community and society that has gave so much to them. In effect of them avoiding civic duties, citizens tend to forget the importance of civic duty for a democracy in its entirety. (Streich) A democracy is a form of government that is run by the people, not by the government but by the people, therefore if the people can not do simple tasks like civic duty than democracy can easily be lost.
The importance of civic duty is much greater than the average citizen wonders, it is not just a couple of hours helping someone in need, it is an obligation as a citizen of democracy to aid the society for it to prosper and become even greater than it is now. One civic duty that is very rarely heard of but is required by all citizens is the civic duty of protecting the constitution. (Streich) This plainly means to obey the law of the land, which a simple task like obeying the law is mandatory for anyone’s civic duty. An extreme example of this would be seen in other parts of the world where crime is very high because people are not obeying the laws or there are no laws for them to follow.
With the previous example, a correlation is shown with crime and civic duty. When a countries’ civic duty increases than crime decrease and vice-versa. This is true using the logic that if citizens do their civic duties and obey the law than society increases as a better place and crime decreases. There is one place where the learning and teaching of civic duty is lacking the most, and that is in the schools of America. (elcivics) An enormous reason why civic duty is so low can be because of the fact that it is rarely taught in school to younger children. It is hard to maintain your liberties when you are not thought them.
The overall feeling that civic duty gives for you is a feeling of warmth and accomplishment because of how important it really is. There is a reason why is makes people feel like the have accomplished a great task, it is because civic duty is the most important task that an American citizen can achieve. With liberty comes duty.
Bibliography
1. "Civic Duty - Definition of Civic Duty by the Free Online Dictionary, Thesaurus and Encyclopedia." Dictionary, Encyclopedia and Thesaurus - The Free Dictionary. Web. 02 Dec. 2010. <http://www.thefreedictionary.com/civic duty>.
2. Citizen, Bargain. "Is Civic Duty Optional?" American Thinker. 26 June 2010. Web. 02 Dec. 2010. <http://www.americanthinker.com/2010/06/is_civic_duty_optional.html>.
3. Streich, Michael. "Duties of American Citizenship: Responsibilities Include Voting, Jury Duty, and Paying Taxes." Suite101.com: Online Magazine and Writers' Network. 26 Oct. 2009. Web. 02 Dec. 2010. <http://www.suite101.com/content/duties-of-american-citizenship-a162858>.
4. "Learning ESL Civics." Civics Lessons and EL Civics Activities for ESL Students. Web. 02 Dec. 2010. http://www.elcivics.com/civics.html.
Analysis on my thematic implication and how it applies to civic duty
Before stepping into Andre House, I did not view community service or civic duty as anything of an importance. I saw it like a time to help homeless people at a shelter and to maybe feel good about myself when I was done with my ten hours. What I experienced was nothing to that extent at all, once I stepped foot into Andre House I viewed many groups of different people like college students, high school students, seniors, and families all working together to help these people in need. This astonished me into thinking how this is what the American society should be like for all Americans. The civic duty I did opened my eyes to show me how the civic duties of American citizens are so vital in shaping their democracy.
The ten hours I put into my life for helping people in a lower social-economic status than me truly felt like thirty minutes. For the reason that, once I really felt what civic duty was like and what it really meant to this democracy, the time and work did not affect me at all. This is such a great help to society because of its importance and what it teaches to the American citizen. The time and effort that is put in truly hinders the society into the belief that it is a service without any reward (money), but in fact it has the greatest reward of them all. Benefiting the society you live in so that you can live with your liberties and reach your dreams.
The day that affected me the most was Thanksgiving. For me, I thought of Thanksgiving of a time that families come together and someone’s house and feast and be thankful for their food. Seeing all these families at Thanksgiving volunteering at Andre House immensely changed my perspective on what the best way to be thankful really is, and that is by helping your society and giving back to it. These forms of service truly show an individual how thankful they really should be. It opens their eyes in seeing that their liberties are one of the most important things they have and how much of an honor it is to be called an American citizen.
Civic duty is shown to the society as a labor and time consuming effort to help society, but once any civic duty is done than the person is really shown the importance of civic duty. The civic duty that I accomplished gave me more of a sense of gratefulness and joys knowing that I gave food to people that do not have a home and have a tough life. This civic duty may have not benefited all of America or a great number of people but it did give food to two hundred homeless people for the night. There are many civic duties to choose from and the extent of them is limitless. For example, the civic duty of volunteering for the military gives you the sense of a duty to protect the American people and a sense of patriotism for your country. Another civic duty like aiding your state legislator in a campaign gives you more of a political outlook on the importance and uniqueness of our government.
Civic duty can have multiple effects on people, so that is why it is very efficient that civic duty can be done in a variety of different places. The experience of civic duty should beyond doubt be experienced by every American citizen so society can be helped to a maximum extent and so that every citizen knows how important civic duty is in a democracy.
