Community Service Graduation Requirement-SDUSD

TO: San Diego Unified School District Board of Education Trustees and Superintendent Dr. Carl Cohn

We, the undersigned students of the San Diego Unified School District, object to the forced community service volunteering graduation requirement.

We demand that the school district's high schools comply with the May 12, 1998 district policy on service learning which states that volunteering is NOT MANDATED AS PART OF THE SAN DIEGO CITY SCHOOLS curriculum.

We demand that all students must be informed that the trustees granted students the right to choose not to participate in service learning or community service.

We demand to be informed that we cannot be denied a high school diploma or be penalized in grading if we choose not to perform service learning or community service. Students may choose to complete an essay or work experience in place of providing the volunteer hours. All students who complete the volunteer hours have a right to have the service learning credit recorded on report cards and transcripts for students in grades 6-12.

Respectfully, students recognize that not all of us have the opportunity to volunteer because we are working to support our families, expending all our free time to study so that we may pass the State-required courses including the CAHSEE or choose to participate in enrichment activities that will benefit us in our futures.

Also, it is unfair that some high schools set hours requirements at 15 hours or 25 hours or 75 hours or 200 hours without a basis for why the hours are different or why more hours are beneficial within the same district. Hours required in the senior year do not benefit students applying for college or scholarships as our academic/life history are reviewed at the end of the 11th grade.

This burden of forced volunteering may cause struggling students to drop out of high school because they do not think they can do all the required volunteer hours and their studies. Some students have not graduated because they failed a class due to trying to meet the volunteer hour requirement.

Respectfully, we ask to be treated with respect and acknowledgment that we are moving into adulthood and have a right to make decisions about our lives. We recognize the importance of getting involved in our community and do not have to be forced to volunteer. We are intelligent and have good moral values taught to us by our families and our churches.

The Honorable Governor Pete Wilson eloquently stated to the Members of the California Senate on 9/23/1998 when he vetoed a mandatory service learning requirement, I am returning Senate Bill No 2068 without my signature. Strangely, CPEC, ignoring the clear evidence of its own (1994) report, seeks to engage Californias public universities in a grand effort to compel its students to do what they are volunteering to do based on speculation that they may, for some reason, stop. Curriculum contact and graduation requirements should be the prerogativeand should be based upon real life considerations more solid than speculation.

In keeping with the California legislatures intent, school districts are encouraged to promote volunteering not to implement forced volunteering.
(www.leginfo.ca.gov/pub/99-00/bill/asm/ab_1901-1950/ab_1...) Education Code 51225.3

Since we, the students of the San Diego Unified School District, first learned the Pledge of Allegiance and the Supreme Law of the Land Our United States of America we learned this is the Land of Liberty the freedom to conduct our lives without fear of tyrants imposing their will upon us for arbitrary and unknown reasons.

We demand our constitutional right to spend our free time as we, with our parents and guardians guidance, feel will benefit us most in our individual endeavors and make decisions about our futures as adults. We have the right to volunteer if we choose without fear of losing our high school diploma and graduation ceremony which we have earned in 13 years in public school instruction.

We, therefore, request that the service learning/community service requirement be implemented fairly and uniformly in all San Diego Unified District high schools in a manner consistent with the United States Constitution, the California Education Code, the California legislatures intent, and the SDUSD district policy with full disclosure to parents and students of students rights regarding the service learning/community service program.