The great social reformer Jane Addams spoke many years ago of the "snare of preparation" she felt when she was a young adult, the feeling that it would be many years before she would be allowed to do something meaningful.
This year, with my yearlong Freshman Inquiry class on Immigration, Migration, and Belonging, I decided that we would start volunteering with vulnerable immigrant children in the winter term. In fact one of the students started volunteering in the fall, despite her fear of going out at night in Portland, to encourage young refugees. Others were much less eager, at least at first.
The work is not always easy. You may hear a lot of sad stories, situations that seem impossible. Many immigrant adolescents feel, or are tempted to feel, hopeless. If they are happy to see you, they won't necessarily let you know.
But I think what my students and I share in the experience, even after hard days, is the knowledge that we are fighting the good fight, that our work is not simply "academic," as it were. I think of each at-risk child of holding a scale, like the scale of justice, in her or his hand. On one side are all the reasons to stop trying: feeling excluded, struggling to learn English, drugs, gangs, alcohol, the temptation to just "chill" and not take school or life seriously. On the other side is the prospect of a better life and the people who care about you: your family; a teacher or two or three; maybe a coach; someone from your church or mosque. And, if we choose to make ourselves available, us. Volunteering with such youth gives my students and I a chance to put our bodies on the line, to be present in a vulnerable child's life as someone who believes and is invested in his or her success and potential.
We don't need a PhD to do that.
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