I think my role as an undergraduate student here at Baruch means that it is my duty to study hard and maintain good grades. I believe that its my job to try my hardest in everything i do and to be a positive influence to those around me. I have this belief because to me, if you are part of a community, then it is your job as well as anyone else’s to help keep that community up and running at its full potential. That applies to non academic things as well. This directly relates to the culture of service the Honor Program promotes. we are all students her at Baruch and those of us in the Honors Programs especially, receive many benefits because of this. That’s why i think the fact that volunteering is part of our curriculum is really important. we receive many benefits (e.g. no tuition, free laptop, amazing resources, etc) whether or not we necessarily NEED them. But, not only are we students, we are also part of the city and the human race. it’s important to always stay humble and appreciative. By encouraging volunteering, it allows us to realize exactly how lucky we have and how we should do everything we can to help others in order to keep our community, as a whole, striving. i think it should be a part of every single person’s mindset, to help out those in need of it and help out the less fortunate (not necessarily humans), and continue to build towards a kinder and more giving human race.

As Baruch students, and as members of greater community, we ought to give back and support the community that has nurtured and continues to nurture us into the people we are today. Being a part of  Baruch Scholars, further reinforces the need to give back. Given the fact that our involvement and participation in school, as well as outside of school, has helped us earn a full scholarship, makes it obvious that the well-being of our community is essential to our success, as well to the success of others.

Although it may be hard to find time to volunteer, and participate in events that do not directly correlate to our long-run academic or professional success, it is still important to do it. Why, you would ask. The answer is simple. Without this community you would have never been able to get where you are today. Thinking on the broader scale, outside of yourself, it is important to note, that one positive action, can and will lead to a chain of events, that will affect many other people.

One of the ways in which the culture of Baruch Honors encourages such behavior, is by creating a requirement for committing some time for volunteering. Some students may see this as an inconvenience, especially their first year, when the pressure to perform is highest. However, having this requirement, may oftentimes provide students with eye-opening experiences, helping them find a passion, while helping their communities grow and improve. Giving back to the community, is thus a responsibility each and every one of is obliged to, and should hesitate to perform.

Serving the New York City community can be done in a number of ways. Simple acts of giving up your seat to an elderly person or opening the door for a disabled person serve the community. This semester and during the Spring 2014 semester, we will be taking further steps towards giving back and helping causes that need attention.  We will be working in NYC and helping the relative causes to our city’s community.

The Honors Program at Baruch has provided us with many benefits and extensive opportunities. These include honors courses, a scholarship, and a Macbook. Therefore, it is our responsibility to give back to the community through sacrificing our time and energy in volunteering. The Honors Program promotes its culture of service through the Freshman Seminar course which focuses on helping the community. Through volunteering, we hope to realize how fortunate we are to have the opportunities that we do.

As we better our communities through service, we better ourselves. We become more generous, understanding, and helpful. Giving has always been better than receiving. It is my role in the program to grow while I experience working as a volunteer in NYC.  I think one of the goals of the program to is to connect students with their surrounding communities.  As we donate our time for the benefit of others, we can find causes that we are passionate about. Hopefully, we will continue to work and volunteer to help the community of NYC.

To serve our community is a way we give back to those less fortunate or those in need. It is a way to show that you care about others and now just dwell in your self-interests. Serving our community should not be looked upon as something we need to do to fulfill a community service requirement. It should be looked upon as something we want to do out of the goodness of our hearts. It should be done to help those that are in need and to bring a smile on their faces. Nothing is more pleasurable and gratifying as knowing you’ve made an impact on someone’s life, or a group of people. I believe serving our community is an obligation we all have to provide opportunities to those who are not given any and to those who are not able to make anything out of what they are given.

Being enrolled in the prestigious Honors Program here at Baruch, we have many resources at our disposable, and many opportunities are presented to us on our road to success. In a sense, we are taking these opportunities given to us. However, we should not only take but also give back. As a Baruch honors program student, it is our responsibility to set a role model for others and for future generations to come, that we should happily and without any interior motive behind it, give back to the community which we’ve been raised in. We should work together in creating an environment that not only prospers, but grows together.

I look forward to volunteering at non-profit organizations here at Baruch and I hope I am able to make a difference in my community. I also hope to meet new people, share new ideas, and come across valuable, perspective-changing experiences whilst serving my community.

A community is a place where one belongs, it’s a group one is able to identify with. Currently  I belong to the community of New York and more specifically a community of Russians.  As a Russian I went to Big Apple Academy, and when I graduated I gave back to my community by volunteering in the Day Camp, being a counselor for kids who were very much like myself.

With the start of Fall 2013, I become part of a new community, a part of Baruch. It is going to take some time to find out exactly how it is that I belong here. With the club fair it is safe to say that I have a good idea. I plan to join the performance arts club as well as some honors societies. I also want to give back to the Baruch community by joining Team Baruch.

As a Baruch Scholar I am given a lot, courtesy of the Baruch community, and the city. In return for the free tuition and laptop, it is my duty to give back to the community. The volunteer requirement we are given should be an obvious factor of what we Scholars can do for our community. It is a way to say thank you to the community that has done so much for us. For my volunteer project, my group and I will be delivering food to the elderly. This is a project I wanted to undertake out of free will back in high school when I was the leader of my organization and I am excited to get the chance to do it now. I am excited for all the opportunities Baruch presents for me and can’t wait to see where this journey takes me.

As a part of Baruch Scholars, we have a duty to be more than just a regular Baruch student. We owe it to Baruch, who has given us this wonderful scholarship, to give a little bit of ourselves back to the community. I feel like any role we take in the broader community or Baruch is a relevant one, as long as it impacts someone or something and makes you feel good. I know this sounds broad, but to me, being a part of the Honors Program does not necessarily mean volunteering. Yes volunteering could be a source of impacting the community, but you could also do so by getting involved in something more than school.

I am in the Baruch play now. I put a lot of my time into it. I feel like this is a form of giving back to the community at Baruch. I know that this does not meet the requirements of what the Baruch Scholars Honors Program requires as community service, but I still feel that it is. The Baruch community is based on involvement in my opinion, and any involvement you can make aside from just going to class should be admired.

Of course, helping an organization that promotes some kind of social philanthropy is a little bit more moving than doing something solely that’s for you and a part of the Baruch community. I see why we are asked to volunteer. It’s a great way to help someone or something that needs more help than you.

Being a Baruch Scholar means that we are people who should set higher standards and be seen as a good influence or example for others. A Baruch Scholar is not only mandated to maintain excelling grades, but he or she is also required to volunteer each semester. In exchange for being given so many opportunities and resources, from the free tuition and laptops to the lounges available through out campus, we should give back to the community. We, Baruch Scholars, are not performing community service because it’s expected of us. We are helping because it’s the right thing to do. Scholars use the knowledge obtained throughout their education and experiences to help out those who are less advantaged. Also, by volunteering, Scholars are able to connect to real life citizens. We are able to learn how to utilize our communication skills and connect with normal, everyday people or nature. Lastly, community service is not something that should be taken lightly. Though at first, people may think that volunteering is helping those less fortunate or taking care of the community’s resource, volunteers do learn and take something back from the service. Volunteers are able to learn more about the people involved or the story behind various objects. The people and animals involved all have different stories, and we seldom take time to ask about them. However, community service gives us this chance of reaching out to various people, people who we may have never noticed or paid any attention to before.

Baruch Honors Program requires all student to perform community service every term for these reasons. The program is to ensure that students are able to connect and branch out from their comfort zone. It is also a valuable experience, which many students tend to gain much insight from. Lastly, we learn that community service is a life long commitment. There will always be others who need help more than we do, whether it be someone who needs a helping hand or just someone who needs a mentor. Without community service, in general, people would not be able to understand what it meant to be privileged nor would they be able to see or listen about the different experiences that many others have had.

Community is a word that can be limited to a specific population but can also be generalized to a much larger population. It ranges from a school community to a global community. Further, you also have communities in different sectors of work, such as the business community, the law community, the arts community, and so on. When the question arises of how we should give back to our community, there are many routes that can be taken. Giving back to the community can be through volunteer work, through paid work, or just through sheer dedication to succeed in a career field so as to ensure that a college’s decision to invest time and money on you was a wise one. There is also a fourth option and that is to give back through all of the aforementioned means.

I personally agree with the last option. For me, volunteer work is a way to lend a hand, or a shoulder to lean on, to those who want one. I am someone who is, to mention a few, passionate about the environment and global warming (in elementary and middle school whenever I was asked to choose a topic to write a paper on, the topic would usually be precisely that–global warming), and someone who cares about hunger and disabilities. A few weeks ago, I had gotten into a philosophical conversation with a friend regarding the reason behind altruism, or the need or desire to help others that is intrinsic to all human beings, and the idea is something that I am still exploring and trying to unravel. As of now all I know is that for me it is important to help those who are suffering. I have been given many opportunities and through education have been exposed to so many different ideas and topics across the board. As I continue to learn, I also feel it is an opportunity that all should be given. I also strongly believe if you truly want to help someone, you should “teach a man (or woman) to fish rather than providing him (or her) with a catch one day.” When it comes to the field of business, there is greater competition and to incorporate altruism becomes more difficult. However, much of business, too, has altruistic qualities. All businesses create products or services for their own profit. However, these products or services indirectly benefit the community through which they came about and, as a result, increasing the quality of life for all. Of course, volunteer work is a more direct approach when giving back to the community, while success and work in any field is a more winded approach to the question, but is still just as effective.

As a Baruch Scholars student, I feel I should give back to the community for multiple reasons–the first being my part altruistic nature. The Baruch Honors program has provided me with an array of opportunities that not all students receive. The college expresses faith in me by investing in my education. Thus, I believe I should give back to the Baruch community through volunteer work and, most importantly, through investing my own time and effort into my education and  emerging a much more successful individual through my journey.

I’ve always thought that it was important to give back to the community you come from. That as a part of being human it is withing our social and moral duty to help up those around you. So with that said I think my role as a Baruch scholar and my duty to Baruch and the community is the same even if I didn’t receive this scholarship: help those around you.

Within Baruch I am a student and a photographer. As a student my duty is to help those around me also succeed. This doesn’t just mean helping people network and offering some study help, it means actively pushing those around me to greater and newer heights. As a student it means helping my fellow Baruchians navigate through the struggles and not just do well but, if possible, set a even higher standard for themselves. My duty as a student is to help those around me.

We are the fortunate. By some virtue of our abilities or divine predestination we are given this opportunity to attend college for free. But not only that, we are given resources and a solid foundation for our collegiate growth. And I think this ties into the culture of service within the Honors Program. We are told again and again that we should help the community but, at least for me, only when I was given such a better position did those words sing to me. I saw it as I’m succeeding and I should help those around me succeed too. So I think our role as Baurch scholars is simply to give back and help those around you in both social and academic settings.

     As a student at Baruch, I was lucky enough to be able to be a Baruch Scholar in the Honors Program.  I believe that because so much has been given to my fellow scholars, and I, that our role in this program should not only be about working towards a great education, but also be to helping our community.  We have been given everything to go to school, and there are so many people significantly less fortunate than us.  It should be our duty as well as our pleasure to help those in need.    

     In my short time spent at Baruch I have noticed the school takes volunteering very seriously.  It is clear that they want us to realize the benefits of helping our community.  Baruch demands a certain number of hours of community service.  I think this is beneficial because it makes people start helping.  Often, starting is the biggest struggle.  It also gives people multiples opportunities and reasons to keep trying to find the volunteer program that best fits their interests. 

     I have always been involved in multiple volunteer programs, and I truly love to see that Baruch shares that passion with me.   Personally, I think that everyone should volunteer, and Baruch makes my belief become reality.  There’s no reason not to help your community.  If you’re interested in nature you can clean a park.  If you are interested in helping others, volunteer at a soup kitchen.  Do you have a love for animals?  Then volunteer at a shelter.  There are so many opportunities to help others that will be beneficial and entertaining.  There’s nothing holding you back from making a difference.