The return of the indentured servant.
These guys would know and help out:
“Foundation for Individual Rights in Education”
Yes they can, since your engagement with the college is voluntary.
It is no worse than making you buy books, laptops, pay for field trips etc.
I know you want to find some evil Constitutional Sacrilege here, but this ain’t it.
You need to understand the difference between the Government forcing people to do things against their will and people agreeing to give up their rights as part of a contract.
Well...since the Fed’s have taken over all public student loans....we can expect more of this type of baloney.
Service learning.
Community of practice.
Cohorts.
Let the waders commence wading.....
Is there course credit? If so, how does that work?
What college/university is this?
Are you receiving Government funding (i.e.: Staffords, etc.)?
No, it's not right but then neither is Hussein making service mandantory. I remember back, many years ago, when my long time boss suddenly "expected" everyone donate a portion of their paycheck to the United Way. I refused on principal and it didn't sit well with him. The working environment changed and I left before the hammer fell.
Should be illegal unless it’s one of the tiny handful of US colleges that do not accept any federal financial aid, either directly or via student loans. That said, I wouldn’t be at all surprised if a court upheld it, on the grounds that colleges routinely require students to do all sorts of work without compensation, under the the guise of “homework” or “projects” — all theoretically essential to learning, but often nothing more than busy work.
Is the student newspaper making any noise about this? Has any student tried to select a legitimate organization not on the approved list (especially a non-leftist/liberal organization) and been turned down? I cannot see a court upholding this requirement if there’s clear political or religious bias in what organizations are eligible.
It might work if the college correspondingly gave the students 75 “free” credit hours. As IF.
It would be better for the college if they rewarded students who volunteered on their own with better class scheduling, recognitions, etc... rather than playing to the lowest common denominator, but as long as the students can choose the charity/nonprofit they work for, I’m not against it. It’s actually not too uncommon to have high schools and college programs include some token community service requirement for graduation.
My one reservation would be if the list of potential service organizations was restricted to one agenda, or if there was no option for the student choosing another service org to volunteer at, with some sort of advisory approval.
Sign me up for 75 hours of work for the local Credit Bureau...
If you don’t like it, drop the class. I did, back when my professor wanted me to log in “community service” hours. I had better things to do, like work (for personal profit[gasp!]).
Though I could imagine learning, in some sense of the word, while doing whatever it is volunteers do, I didn’t see what it had to do with liberal education.
They have been doing it for years under internship programs.
Is it a public or private college?
What groups are on the list?
College is voluntary. If you don’t want to take on a service project, you don’t have to go.
Requiring college students to do 75 hours of volunteer work over four years or even over one year is hardly anything outrageous.
There must be a school, hospital, nursing home, charity, youth organization that you approve of that someone could make a difference by volunteering at.
My son’s High School did this as a graduation requirement. I went in to the school board and told them in no uncertain terms that my sons were not going to participate in any force volunteerism. Hence, it was no longer voluntary. He graduated anyway but was not allowed to go to the graduation ceremony. Which was fine with us. We had our own ceremony and it was much shorter and better.
Colleges can require such things as degree requirements. As you are paying to attend and therefore can choose to leave if the terms are unacceptable.