Bill would require undergrads to mentor...

http://wral.com/news/state/story/2991368/

Quote :

"“Society invests a huge amount of money in our young people in our universities. I don’t think it’s unreasonable to say you ought to give a little back,” Rand said Wednesday. ... The bill, filed last week, would require any student seeking a bachelor's degree to spend 20 hours per semester mentoring and tutoring a public school-age child. The bill doesn't specify for how many semesters the mentoring would be required."

Thoughts?

Personally, I think it's idiotic. Just another liberal dem trying to "better society", but failing miserably.

6/4/2008 6:49:26 PM

I support this only if politicians, and all full-time university staff and faculty are also required to do the same. Just because students are young, doesn't mean they're overrun with free time. Furthermore, what qualifies university students to mentor younger children? I know plenty of university students who have no business around young children.

[Edited on June 4, 2008 at 6:54 PM. Reason : can't type]

6/4/2008 6:54:20 PM

ibtl...already a thread on this

6/4/2008 6:55:11 PM

Oops!

+1 to my post count

6/4/2008 6:58:50 PM

if only they could make the same program but optional...

6/4/2008 8:33:45 PM

more stupid feel-good legislation. we've got too many ridiculous laws and regulations as it is.

6/4/2008 9:13:04 PM

it won't pass. Volunteering should be an activity individuals choose to participate in b.c they desire to give back and help the community. Further more individuals who volunteer often pick a variety of programs which they most enjoy and feel their time would best benefit. Examples include habitat for humanity, adopt a freeway, mentoring, helping at the soap kitchen, volunteering around campus, etc.

Those who choose to mentor kids do so b.c they enjoy helping out youth and feel they have a knack for teaching. Time is a finite resource; requiring all students to mentor kids would take away help from all the other organization that rely on student volunteers; who are instead forced to mentor. All this will do is bring in a bunch of unenthusiastic students helpers and bad mentors into the public school system. I couldn't imagine having some foreign Indian engineering student coming to my middle school and trying futilely to help me with my algebra homework.

This is kind of like increasing income taxes on the middle/upper classes to pay for all the working and poor people to have universal healthcare. Those with money who before had the ability to donate to the charity of their choice (with tax benefits of course) would now have less free money; then as a added slap in the face would have to deal with longer lines and increased cost for their own healthcare (following supply and demand curves)


By the way beyond the obvious problems with this bill what about the soul logistics. Who is going to provide the transportation to those students lacking cars? Does this mean students will have to rearrange their schedules also in order to accommodate mentoring time? I may have a prerequisite class at 3:30-5pm. School goes until 2-3. So will i have to visit Tyronne in the ghetto from 6-8; dodging bullets as i leave the ghetto after dark?

[Edited on June 4, 2008 at 9:49 PM. Reason : l]

6/4/2008 9:36:06 PM

Quote :

"Society invests a huge amount of money in our young people in our universities. I don’t think it’s unreasonable to say you ought to give a little back"

I didn't ask for society to fund universities, so don't ask me to give anything "back" when I didn't want what you offered in the first place.

6/4/2008 9:44:43 PM

^ Not to mention our parents (assuming you get in-state) and you (following graduation) is paying for the UNC System through your NC income taxes. I have a job in wilmington so through my NC payroll taxes i am pretty much paying NC back. Almost its like reverse social security. Instead of me paying for current retirees with my tax money and the future generation paying mine; i am instead paying for current students following my college education paid for by the previous generation.

I hope liberal senator Tom Rand will pay for my gas to drive all the way to SouthEast High

[Edited on June 4, 2008 at 9:53 PM. Reason : l]

6/4/2008 9:51:51 PM

don't count on it.

6/4/2008 9:59:15 PM

I just think it's funny that a compulsory altruism bill is being proposed by someone named "Rand"...

6/4/2008 10:01:20 PM

I just got a "Legislative Update" from Rand in the mail. I'm not going to waste my time reading it.

6/4/2008 10:03:00 PM

I almost would not be totally against some type of community service requirement for college students

ie

50 hours of community service at a credible organization before graduation. This would allow students to work into their schedule and planning on when they do community service and who they best wish to serve. I may decide to lighten my load one semester to 12 credit hours and knock out 40 of my hours with the spare time i have one semester then do no community service the next semester. What this bill proposes though is ludacris; a per semester quota and a mandate on what type of service to perform (mentoring). What happens if i come up short with only 16 hours one semester. Will i be kicked out of school?

Also, what if Junior Johnny Dealer is a convicted felon; who managed to get into NCSU after serving his sentence. I am sure the public school system would balk at having a felon entering their schools. To even serve as an assistant coach to my friend who is the sanderson wrestling coach; even as a volunteer you have to have a full background check. So beyond just inconveniencing college; the public school system would be burdened with the additional cost of getting background checks for all its mentors.

6/4/2008 10:07:44 PM

Quote :

"soul logistics"

PREACH IT!

6/4/2008 10:32:01 PM

i think congress appropriates upwards of 98billion dollars a year towards student loans/ financial aid/ and scholarships

there's a lot of people that dip into this cash every semester

it would be nice if they had to give something back. i'd do it, and wouldn't feel bad if i had too.

6/5/2008 8:11:00 AM

I just think it's funny how the only other group of people that are required to do community service are people that have had run-ins with the law. They're treating you like criminals

6/5/2008 8:13:06 AM

If you have any sort of scholarship from public funds, I don't think this is unreasonable at all. You can find your own money elsewhere if you don't like it.

6/5/2008 9:00:58 AM

this bill is ridiculous. some people actually have to work during college to make ends meet, something i'm sure thats foreign to most of the people reading this. if you have to work 20 - 30 hours a semester to keep from having substantial debt due all your funding coming from student loans then this bill would be detrimental to your future well being and financial security.

that aside, if people are required to do this then the people involved will look at it as a chore and never really put forth the effort something like this would truly deserve. instead of having x kids with genuinely good mentors you'll have a lot of kids with mentors not putting forth a reasonable effort.

whomever posed this bill didn't think it through at all, and it won't get passed.



however, i'd be completely in favor of this bill if those who participated received some sort of tuition reduction for their service to the community. at least that would relieve some of the burden on the student as well as weed out some of the worthless mentors. however, even with this alteration to the bill there would be an influx of people who had no business mentoring in the first place and the percentage of quality mentoring would diminish

[Edited on June 5, 2008 at 9:11 AM. Reason : reduction]

6/5/2008 9:09:17 AM

Quote :

"however, i'd be completely in favor of this bill if those who participated received some sort of tuition reduction for their service to the community. at least that would relieve some of the burden on the student as well as weed out some of the worthless mentors."

.

6/5/2008 9:13:07 AM

I think it's funny someone would propose students giving back for all they've gotten from the state, when every year the state allots less and less money for higher education.

Suppose this bill passed and the current funding trend in NC for higher education continued. In the future, couldn't students say they were receiving less from the state than when the program started, and as a result they should have to give back less. I mean eventually the state would end up owing college students mentoring hours or something.

Ok, so maybe that was a stretch, but it just illustrates the stupidity of students having to compensate the state for something that it's required to do in the first place (make public education affordable for it's citizens).

And what about community colleges? If Bev Purdue has her way, anybody would be able to go to community college for free. Seems like they would owe the state a lot more than 4-year college students would. Should they be required allowed to mentor? I know people who go to community college, and I was smarter/more mature in middle school, than they are now.

This is tantamount to making North Carolina drivers give rides to homeless people because the drivers enjoy the benefits of the roads that they themselves helped pay for!



[Edited on June 5, 2008 at 12:35 PM. Reason : asdf]

6/5/2008 12:34:34 PM

Quote :

"Society invests a huge amount of money in our young people in our universities. I don’t think it’s unreasonable to say you ought to give a little back"

I gave the university money, they gave me the tools for a higher education...seems fairly straightforward

6/5/2008 12:35:21 PM