As the new school year opens and student organizations are kicking their activities into gear, students are going to be faced with the challenge posed by the “new” community service policy. The LCPS policy handbook states that “each middle school and high school may participate in no more than two fund raising activities for charitable or other organizations in any school year.”

While the policy has been in place since 1976, it was not until recently that our faculty and students were aware of it. Dr. Brewer learned of the policy at the end of last school year and informed the staff sponsors of student organizations at a professional development meeting that took place before school started in August.

Since several fundraising events have taken place annually at Dominion in the past, this policy is going to greatly affect every student in the school. According to Mr. Burns, the sponsor of SCA, it will “eliminate those small fundraisers that we did last year.” Last year, SCA was able to take action and raise around $400 in one night when a boy unfortunately died at Park View. Quick fundraisers like this will no longer be possible this year.

Mr. Eifler, who heads up the DHS DECA chapter, says that DECA will probably be “the primary student organization that this is going to affect in the sense of quantity.” Last year alone, DECA was able to host around 6 big fundraising events which means there’s going to be a lot of downsizing this year.

In order to comply with the policy and still allow students to be involved with their community, Brewer and club sponsors are working on a way for all student organizations that want to host philanthropic events to collaborate. Although nothing is set in stone, this may take form in what is called a “Titan Olympics” where clubs come together to host one huge fundraiser.

Brewer says that “staff members believe that all clubs and organizations who wish to conduct charitable fundraisers could participate in the Titan Olympics and, within that single fundraiser, meet most, if not all, of their charitable fundraising goals.”

While this policy may be a hindrance to student involvement within the community, it is up for revision this year. The goal of the policy may have been to keep schools from overwhelming the community by continuously asking for money, but many believe that the policy hinders students from achieving the LCPS mission of living lives of significance.

This year, students will have the opportunity to communicate with the school board in order to review this law and Burns says that SCA will try to partner up with other SCAs across the county in order to do “a little grass-root campaigning.”

However, change is not going to come without action. Burns says, “ultimately it’s going to be the students. It’s not going to be up to the teachers to change this policy. It’s really going to be up to the students.”