We stand behind the sentiments made below, and we think our thousands of stand hosts would feel the same way. Let us know what you think, do you agree?
COMMENTARY
Service is its own reward
By Liz and Jay Scott
Alex's Lemonade Stand Foundation for Childhood Cancer
President Obama recently proposed incentives to get middle and high school students involved in community service, including financial aid for college. If young Americans commit to community service, Obama said, "We will make sure that you can afford a higher education."
We applaud the president's attempts to create change in our country, and a targeted community-service program has great potential to do just that. However, the financial benefits proposed should be secondary to another motivation: helping others.
Through Alex's Lemonade Stand Foundation for Childhood Cancer, which was founded by our daughter, we have seen firsthand that young people reap the true rewards of community service in the satisfaction of doing good for others.
Our daughter Alexandra "Alex" Scott taught us many lessons in what would ultimately be her short lifetime. One of them was that sacrificing her own comforts for others made the biggest difference.
When Alex said she wanted to start a lemonade stand, we were happy to oblige, but we figured that she would want to buy something with the proceeds. We were surprised to hear that her only desire was to give the money to her hospital to help it make a difference for kids with cancer.
Since that time, parents and teachers have told us that their kids seem more motivated to run lemonade stands when the reward is helping others, rather than personal profit. Children have given up their birthday presents to collect donations, given their allowances or money earned through chores, and even collected loose change to contribute to the battle against childhood cancer.
If we monetize community service, offering rewards for doing good deeds, aren't we defeating the entire purpose?
Community service teaches us so many important things. Perhaps most valuable for the country, it builds character. It teaches us to care about each other and the experiences of those around us. It should be required so that we all grow as people, and that we do so together.
Through our experience with our daughter and the work of Alex's Lemonade Stand Foundation, we have learned that many powerful lessons can be garnered from community service, and that perhaps the most important is pride in our own contributions to others.
We hope more Americans will commit to community service, and we also hope that they will do it for the right reasons. Education is important, but community service done for nothing more than the greater good might just be more important than anything an education can teach us about the world.
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2 comments:
Hi. My son, Ben, age 10 was diagnosed with Chronic Myeloid Leukemia in May 2008. We've had tremendous support since that time. With the help of friends, we had a private audience with then Senator Obama in September 2008. During our meeting, Ben suggested that the program for service to help with education costs be offered to high school students. The future President told my son that he thought it was a "good idea" to have H.S. juniors & seniors involved and that he would consider it. Now, I don't know whether the call to service in exchange for educational costs will be offered to high school students. Yet I believe that if it is, then perhaps my son, Ben, currently battling a rare form of cancer, may have helped bring that idea to fruition. (Ben also suggested that the first family consider adopting a shelter dog, but we know now that that didn't happen.) Ben now wants to become a U.S. Senator and I believe he will be a very good one with great ideas to help us all.
Our children learn service by example. They might take part in school programs, they may be Girl Scouts, Boy Scouts, or simply learn it through the work their families do to contribute to their communities. After all, the root of the word community - means "to come together." And in the end what goes around, comes around. We were always a part of our community in some small way. We raised our hands when we could, when someone needed another volunteer or help in some way. It never seemed like much. But it came back to us in a huge way when our nine-year-old daughter was diagnosed with osteosarcoma in her leg. It was the week before Labor Day and we needed to let the school know she would not be attending her first day of middle school. We let a few friends know because they would have wondered where she was. In a matter of days, community members poured into our lives, finding ways to make things go smoothly at home, to fill us with love. The outpouring continued with meals, and care, with rides and understanding. Covering for the space and work that we could no longer do. For 10 months, meals arrived 3 times a week until we suggested they stop. Cards arrived to mark every day for my daughter - a tiny bit of joy and a laugh in an envelope. Laundry was done, errands were run. And even after chemo and my daughter and husband were back home, with many more months of rehab, counseling, etc, people found ways to work with us and Make A Wish, to give of themselves even more than they had before. We made friends of strangers. And are the better for it.
Community Service is the gift that keeps giving - it brings joy.
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