Noble Street College Prep Community Service Program
Community service is defined as an activity or event which involves work that serves the community supervised by an approved non-profit organization or government agency. The activity or event must have a direct, positive impact on the community. In keeping with the Noble Way, Noble Street students LEARN more about their community by becoming actively involved in it, HONOR their community by donating time and effort, and practice SELF-DISCIPLINE as they are accountable to the people for whom they volunteer
In order to pass the community service graduation requirement, students are expected to complete a minimum of 80 community service hours according to the benchmarks outlined below. All hours must be completed at pre-approved sites or projects.
Earning Community Service Hours
There are three ways students can earn community service credit toward their 80 hour graduation requirement. These ways are:
- Attending a community service trip/event organized or promoted by Noble’s community service program.
- Volunteering on their own at an Approved Service Site on the list of sites pre-approved for all Noble students.
- Volunteering on their own at site an individually approved site—a site which has not been approved for all Noble students, but which has been approved for an individual one.
Community Service Trips
Noble regularly sponsors field trips to various non-profit organizations and events at which students may volunteer for community service credit. These organizations include such non-profits as the Greater Chicago Food Depository, Franciscan House, the Chicago Marathon, Vital Bridges, Cook Country Forest Preserve, and many others.
Volunteering at Approved Service Sites
Noble Street maintains a list of more than 20 non-profit organizations and schools at which all Noble students are pre-approved to volunteer for community service credit. Students may obtain a copy of this list from the community service program director.
Volunteering at Individually Approved Sites
If a student would like to volunteer at a non-profit organization, school, or church not on Noble’s list of Approved Service Sites, h/she may get that site approved for him/her by obtaining an approval letter from the community service program director and bringing it to the staff member at the site they want approved and who would supervise their work at that site. That staff member must then write Noble’s community service program director a letter following the guidelines printed on the approval letter they were given by the student. This process must be repeated at the beginning of every school year for a student to continue receiving credit for the volunteer work they complete at that site.
NOTE: Students may not receive community service credit for volunteering at a for-profit business/company, or at any non-profit organization/school/church at which a family member works—either in a paid employee or volunteer capacity—due to the potential for special treatment and/or conflicts of interest that might arise.