Anonymous wrote:My current sophomore is terrible with requirements like this. She’s done lots of volunteer hours without filling out the paperwork, and she has some that she filled out but never submitted.

She’s also had forms submitted correctly that were never recorded by school staff as well as activities that promised SSL hours that never signed off on the forms.

So, it’s partly her and partly the school and community staff.

Despite the instructions you can submit it late and get credit. I do not think anyone really looks..maybe they review a sample.

Anonymous wrote:At my high school they were offering 3 SSL for watching some 30 minute training on Canvas. Only 30% of students bothered to finish it even though they were given time in homerooms. At the end of last year 10% of seniors still didn’t have enough by early May. Somehow they all made it. Probably just watching videos or something that clearly is not the intent of the law.

At my last middle school, I got frustrated by random students showing up to after school events expecting to be given SSL hours for standing around. They also expected that I would feed them. Then they complained about the pizza I purchased with my own money. It really put me off doing anything related to SSL hours.

Some other counties don't allow middle schoolers to earn hours as credit for this reason. They feel like the majority of MS students do not try meaningful service. Some schools in MCPS have students whose parents think they will get a college scholarship based on an obscene number of hours that don't even seem possible - like 8 hours every Sat and again on Sun with 40 hour weeks in the summer.

I always liked the days at my school when students would make sandwiches for shelters just because that is true service, IMO, compared to completing a Canvas module or submitting a form full of fluffed up hours.

At my high school they were offering 3 SSL for watching some 30 minute training on Canvas. Only 30% of students bothered to finish it even though they were given time in homerooms. At the end of last year 10% of seniors still didn’t have enough by early May. Somehow they all made it. Probably just watching videos or something that clearly is not the intent of the law.

At my last middle school, I got frustrated by random students showing up to after school events expecting to be given SSL hours for standing around. They also expected that I would feed them. Then they complained about the pizza I purchased with my own money. It really put me off doing anything related to SSL hours.

My current sophomore is terrible with requirements like this. She’s done lots of volunteer hours without filling out the paperwork, and she has some that she filled out but never submitted.

She’s also had forms submitted correctly that were never recorded by school staff as well as activities that promised SSL hours that never signed off on the forms.

So, it’s partly her and partly the school and community staff.

It's not equitable. Well to do parents set up non profits for their kids and have them do programs like "bake muffins for sad athletes". The kids look amazing for having spearheaded and ran a non profit while the kids of working parents cant find a ride to do roadside cleanup.

Anonymous wrote:This is at DS's upper-mid-tier MCPS high school based on the notices they've sent out. How does this happen? These kids have so many opportunities to get hours and get so many reminders. Parents get a lot of reminders also. These students have had many years to get this done.

If the SSL rule is so hard to get students to comply with, maybe it should just be eliminated.

LOL no.

Anonymous wrote:My HS gave students 3 hours just for filling out a 15 min survey.

This right here is the problem. The system engages in openly fraudulent practices. In plain sight.

Anonymous wrote:Mine did it by helping out teachers after school or by supporting special events or by assisting the media specialist or other specials.

Yeah. There aren’t that many teachers that want that much help for thousands of kids at a school to each do dozens of hours. I know so many kids who knocked theirs out by their parents paying for them to be “aides” at a summer camp where I know for certain they were very little help to the people running the camp. I think there are lots of kids doing very meaningful public service but it’s not super well correlated with the SSL hour program.

Mine did it by helping out teachers after school or by supporting special events or by assisting the media specialist or other specials.

My daughter finished hers in the seventh grade. It wasn't hard at all to pull off. Students are just lazy and I don't see an issue with it as a requirement.

SSL is dumb and pointless. That said the schools give out ssl for pointless activities and it’s easy to bs “community service”. If you don’t have your hours by graduation, then you should not graduate.

It’s also stupid and ridiculous that MCPS won’t graduate kids for SSL but does everything in the power to push kids along who can’t even read, or chronically absent and failing. But god forbid they don’t have their
SSL.

Anonymous wrote:Both my kids had done over 130 hours by the end of 7th grade.

It is pathetic that this has not been completed by so many high school students.

There are still about 4 or 5 states where this is mandatory.

Great for you. But you also have free time to waste on DCUM so presumably you’ve got time and income to spare. A lot of MCPS parents don’t have the resources to shuffle their kids around to get SSL hours or to pay to get them done at summer camp. Check your privilege.

Both my kids had done over 130 hours by the end of 7th grade.

It is pathetic that this has not been completed by so many high school students.

There are still about 4 or 5 states where this is mandatory.

Anonymous wrote:This is at DS's upper-mid-tier MCPS high school based on the notices they've sent out. How does this happen? These kids have so many opportunities to get hours and get so many reminders. Parents get a lot of reminders also. These students have had many years to get this done.

If the SSL rule is so hard to get students to comply with, maybe it should just be eliminated.

So many other things to worry about. Should not be a requirement for graduation. The bulk of SSL hours completed are not truly for community service anyway.

My son has done probably hundreds of hours of service with Boy Scouts over the years but he never turns in the forms. I think a lot of kids do a bunch of service in the early years but don’t bother to turn in the forms because it always seems like they’ll have a bunch more time to do it. Then Junior and senior year they are busy and don’t have as much time. They should just require it be done by sophomore year or something. I actually think the whole system is bad because I hear kids all the time talking about various BS ways to get the credit — I don’t think it actually inspires anyone to become more publicly minded. It turns it all into a transaction.

My father who great up very poor in anm immigrant family was actively offended by this requirement. He worked all day frm when he was a small child in addition to doing all his homework etc. He has no recreational hours at all. So there are probably kids like that too that are trying to keep their families afloat.