“I don’t know what your destiny will be, but one thing I do know:
the only ones among you who will be really happy are those who
have sought and found how to serve.”
- Albert Schweitzer
Middleburg Academy’s community service program is a reflection of the school’s stated mission “to develop young men and women of moral integrity who will be responsible leaders and citizens in a diverse and ever-changing world.” (see Mission, Heritage & Values)
A number of high schools set some level of community service expectations for their students; what is less common is to find the goals of moral development and service to others so intricately woven into a school’s history, mission, and curriculum as they are here at Middleburg Academy.
Our community service goals are much broader than accumulating the twenty-five hours required of each student, each year (and the one hundred hours needed to graduate). We teach “authentic service” in order to promote an active, engaged citizenry; this is the kind of service that:
- contributes to the solution of a problem;
- connects an individual to his or her community;
- expands a student’s experience, perspective, and comfort zone;
- instills a sense of social responsibility; and
- includes reflection and evaluation.
These goals are largely accomplished through year-long Freshman, Sophomore, and Junior Middleburg Academy Seminars where students study the major world religions, are taught to think critically about tough ethical questions, and then respond through service projects that they plan, choose, and carry out themselves.
Service to others takes place inside and outside of school, individually and collectively, locally and globally. Annual campus-wide projects include an Oxfam Banquet, the Green Club’s Electronics Recycling Drive, a “lock-in” to raise funds for St. Jude’s Research Hospital for children, a holiday toy drive for the local Seven Loaves Food Pantry, as well as each advisory adopting an area family beginning at Thanksgiving time. Individually, some students and faculty have also felt called to areas of great need in faraway places. Service immersion projects have taken our students and faculty to the Forgotten Children Ministries of Honduras, an environmental/wilderness trek in the far reaches of Peru, and a teaching and cultural exchange opportunity in China, to name just a few. Others have identified needs right here at home, focusing on such local and regional causes as the Middleburg Humane Foundation, therapeutic riding, and Purcellville’s Main Street Homework Club for local youth.