Lakeside’s Middle School Service Learning Program seeks to develop the desire and ability to give back to one’s community. Through Middle School service learning, students come to understand that we all can learn from each other; that it is never too early to have an impact; and that the common good is everyone’s responsibility.

Middle School service learning is conducted in grade-level groups during the school day throughout the year. Specific projects may shift from year to year, but they all involve active learning and are focused on real local needs. Students work side-by-side with their teachers, which promotes a sense of shared purpose and community.

Service learning is a powerful and important part of students’ education at Lakeside Upper School. The program enables students to respond to real needs in the community while expanding their understanding of the places and communities in which they live and learn, deepening compassion, developing a sense of social justice, and engaging in meaningful self-reflection. Lakeside’s Service Learning Program enables students to make a difference in both the on-campus Lakeside community and in the larger local community. An array of opportunities, including numerous areas of need and geographical locations in the greater Seattle area, allow students to cultivate relationships with our partner organizations while intentionally going outside of their comfort zones to meet new people, try new activities, learn from community leaders, practice humility and empathy, and reflect on what they’ve learned.  

The program begins with a group orientation in the fall of the 9th grade, after which students are eligible to begin volunteering through the Service Learning Program. These orientations are just the beginning of the support available to students as they begin to identify goals, interests, and passions that align with the program’s learning goals and the opportunities available through community partners. 

Throughout their time at the Upper School, students will complete at least 80 hours of volunteering through Lakeside’s Service Learning Program and our network of around 80 local partner organizations. Each partner offers students the opportunity to engage in direct, on-site engagement with that partner’s mission, focused on systemic problems such as structural inequality and environmental issues.  Partners include the Green Cities Partnership, Rainier Valley Food Bank, Compass Housing Alliance, and Tilth Alliance. 

Service isn’t siloed from the rest of a student’s education: Lakeside classes find creative ways to integrate service into academic studies. This includes Human Development classes culminating with a health justice project in which students research how health issues are being addressed in our local community, and 10th-grade English classes weaving  service into students’ thematic exploration of the meaning of “home.” These opportunities give students new lenses for making connections between the disciplines and provide touchpoints for talking about how service exists in our lives. 

Students formally reflect on their experiences throughout their Upper School years, and their learning culminates in a senior capstone project. Through reflections, learning becomes visible, as students make connections between their experiences directly serving their communities, what they’re learning in the classroom, and their own values and life experiences. 

By the time they deliver their capstones, our goal is for students to have had powerful opportunities to reflect on what it means to be a good community member, including consciously engaging in complexities such as the power dynamics inherent in the concept of service. By building sustained relationships over time with partner organizations, students can experience a reciprocal, mutually beneficial form of service in which they arrive in the community ready to listen, learn, and work alongside others.