"Performing" Community Service Work: A Collaborative Model of Inquiry

Schools do not often make the local community architecture, its historical and cultural roots or its economic and political structures a focus of study. The community's storytellers, craftspersons, builders, day-care providers are not common visitors. The literature that is read has generally not been selected because it illuminates the life that students see day in and day out outside of school (Perrone, 1995, p. 347). Furthermore, many schools and most academic course work ignores the act of performance as "an occasion for contesting, qualifying, affirming and negotiating various understandings of the ... world" (Pollock, 1990, p 35). Academic classes rarely take advantage of the powerful impact community based learning experiences offer. Relegated to a less intellectual status, oral communication and dialogistic exchange is regarded as not rigorous enough to compete with more traditional didactic learning styles, requiring written demonstration of knowledge acquisition. Turner (1982) claims that our dependence on written reports of learning originated in the desire to pattern human scientific work after that of the natural sciences. Furthermore, he states this method of knowledge display has no privilege over oral formats, noting the elements of social life are bound to the point of being" only comprehensible by the investigator as lived experience, his/hers as well as, in relation to, theirs" (p. 89). Experiential learning has a long history of providing a more effective and engaging educational event (Dewey, 1916). Still, there is resistance to acknowledge the strength of the oral tradition which sustained cultures and civilization,; for centuries. Including connections between classrooms and communities in academic course work enhances instructional efficacy by moving theory into practice. The literature substantially demonstrates the discontinuity between classroom instruction and community culture (Foster, 1993; Hale, 1991; Irvine, 1991; Ladson-Billings, 1992; Walker, 1993). Other recent studies contend that solutions to this discontinuity reside in the communities from which these under-served students come (Hall, 1991; MacLeod, 1994; Maiga, 1995). Clearly there is a necessity to connect classrooms and communities, and this study intends to support that tenant and buttress it by examining the effective use of cultural performance ethnography with community service learning. This paper will explore the use of community service work in educational environments and discuss performance ethnography as a model for analyzing cultural phenomena. It will examine the community service work performed by a cohort of urban public school teachers and critique the cultural performances created in and from these community service experiences. Finally, this study will survey the impact of cultural performance as a learning tool. Community Service Work and Educational Endeavors A review of the literature reveals that speculation about and fulfillment of community service work comprises many forms. Toranto and Johnson (1984) survey the use of service volunteers within the educational institution. This study shows that parents and community citizens devoting time and energy to classroom and extracurricular activities improves classroom discipline, enhances community public relations, and more importantly, makes experiential knowledge accessible for students, as well as teachers. Furthermore, this study stresses the importance of including community service work in teacher training programs and developing research that informs and course work that supports volunteerism. Effective community service work is viewed by Radest (1993) as finding a way of "grasping the interaction of effective pedagogy and of personal commitment" (p. 22). Value issues regarding community service work become paramount as Radest discusses the gap between those who can and cannot afford to perform community service work because of the value we place on time in our society. …