You don’t have to travel far to find children in need. Most of us legitimately and wholeheartedly want to help those who need it, and if we knew of someone who needed health care, education or food we wouldn’t hesitate to do our best to provide. Many of you have gone on short-term trips to various countries across the globe to give to those who need it. I have found that after taking such a trip, it can become easy to think of people in need as being in a distant part of the world.
The problem with that line of thinking is that it is not based on fact and is not based on what God has commanded us to do, either. God wants our faith to be fruitful through action. As it says in James 2:17: “faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, it is dead.” How are you planning on acting out faith through your life after college? There are outlets for action in this country and kids who desperately need it.
According to the National Assessment of Educational Progress about 50 percent of children in low-income communities in this country will not graduate from high school by age 18 and of those who do graduate about half will perform, on average, at an eighth-grade level. In 2009, a report from McKinsey & Company found that out of America’s top 130 colleges only 9 percent of graduates come from the lower half of the income bracket. And to top it off, a Gates Foundation report found that if you are a child in a low-income community in the United States you have a better chance of going to jail than of getting a four-year college degree.
Does that sound like “people in need” to you? You don’t have to go far to find them.
After graduating from Harding in 2008, I joined Teach for America and moved to Phoenix, Ariz., to teach seventh-and eighth-grade science at a low-income school. What is Teach for America? It is an organization that takes college graduates to one of about 40 areas across the country to teach in low-income schools and, according to teachforamerica.org, is “growing the movement of leaders who work to ensure that kids growing up in poverty get an excellent education.” Teach for America has produced a growing number of individuals who have had a significant impact on education in this country.
Teach for America is now making a push to recruit Harding students. This is one very concrete way you can take action with your faith and influence the lives and futures of children in need. I encourage any of you interested to check out the website (teachforamerica.org) or contact me with any questions or tips on applying. This year’s application deadline is Feb. 10.
Whatever track you choose after college, I hope that it will lead you to a life that produces action and a faith that bears fruit.
