Arrupe's reach spans San Jose, globe

By Erin Chambers

Richie Lumley works with the homeless each week through an Arrupe Center placement, however unlike most students, his placement isn't dictated by a class syllabus but rather his own initiative.

"I hope to develop and maintain relationships with the clients at Julian Street Inn that will give me the opportunity to learn more about the issues involving and pertaining to homelessness and mental disabilities," said the junior double major in philosophy and political science. "I am there to see, listen to, process, and feel their situation, as I share my experiences and myself,"

Lumley committed himself to work at Julian Street through next year as part of a new internship program facilitated by the Arrupe Center for Community Based Learning.

The center, which traditionally places students in community service to enrich learning in a specific class, has recently announced a range of new non-course-based opportunities, such as internships and fellowships for Santa Clara students.

"At this point we're just piloting them to see if it works," said Arrupe Center Director Catherine Wolfe.

Wolfe emphasized that the new programs will be evaluated based on the degree of learning potential for the student.

"People often call us who want to help out, and we send most of those kids to SCCAP," said Wolfe, referring to the student-led Santa Clara Community Action Program. "We are not a volunteer organization."

Community-based learning is one dimension of a greater educational concept in practice across the country called "service learning." According to experts at the Initiative of Community Based Learning operated out of Princeton University, it emphasizes the positive effects of pairing theoretical instruction with actions in the real world.

Mara Marks is the Associate Director of the Center for the Study of Los Angeles at Loyola Marymount University and an expert on service learning. She believes that incorporating non-course-based opportunities into a service learning organization is vital to securing a diverse body of students in the program.

"Professors need to learn to change their syllabi and try new things," said Marks. "Students are hungry for something new, for a way to directly impact society now."

Wolfe agreed, citing that many business and engineering students at Santa Clara do not get involved with the Arrupe Center because their courses require less participation than sociology or communication courses, for example.

"We're trying to expand the number of ways to get on board with non-course-based activity," said Wolfe. "Community-based learning can happen in a lot of different ways."

The Donovan Fellowship program is another way students can become involved through the Arrupe Center without an accompanying class requirement. The program, which offers $1000 grants and stipends, is designed to encourage and support students who want to deepen their understanding of social justice through a summer community-based learning experience.

According to Arrupe Center figures, over 40 Donovan fellows have already spent summers with programs focusing on everything from working with AIDS victims in Malawi to living in post-war El Salvador.

"The family that I lived with in Guarjila this summer ... I consider my own family," said former fellow Kristin Love in a reflection about her experiences last summer. "They took me in to shelter me, feed me, and teach me about their community."

In addition to the internship and summer fellow opportunities, the Arrupe Center has also begun facilitating various immersion trips throughout the year. The trips do not require simultaneous enrollment in a specific class and are designed to incorporate social justice, spirituality and community into a personal educational experience, according to the program's mission statement. Last year, students went to Tijuana and El Salvador among other places.

The Arrupe Center and a $2 million Lily Endowment now fund the Tijuana and El Salvador programs, originally organized through SCCAP. The endowment, the largest of it's kind received by Santa Clara, also supports other projects aimed at discerning one's vocation in Campus Ministry, the Bannan Center for Jesuit Education and the Career Center.

Founded in 1986 as the Eastside Project, the Arrupe Center became a fully-funded university program in the early '90s, gaining its current name in 2001. Pedro S. Arrupe was a 28th general in the Society of Jesus. He spent 27 years as a Jesuit missionary in Japan and was part of the first rescue team to go into Hiroshima after the United States dropped the atomic bomb.

Lumley plans to continue his own rescue mission of sorts, interning at Julian Street through next spring.

"Students as a whole don't know about these new opportunities at the center," said Wolfe. "Once they know, we're hoping to see things really take off."