Service Learning

Organizational Proposal

Submitted by:
Jacob Pehringer and Mariah Burton

Information technology / Business Leadership Program

SLCC Communications 1010
February 5, 2016
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Table of Contents
Section

Page

Overview.....1
Project Description....2
Group Assets.....3
Group Limitations......4
Recommendations....5
Conclusion..6
Work Cited.........7

Overview
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A problem that we noticed in our society is how seniors do not always like living
in senior homes. Mariah has previously volunteered at The Wentworth at Willow creek
Assisted Living and Memory Care home and has seen firsthand how entertainment can
help improve the seniors lives and experience in this home.
Our proposal to solve this problem was to use
Mariahs connections to figure out a way to help
entertain these seniors. How we went about this is
coordinating with the staff to provide exceptional
activities for the seniors to be entertained. We
gathered nine people from company willing to help
and give time to serve their community.
Once we got there, we went and
collected all of the supplies from Parker
who is in charge of all activities that happen at the
senior home. We then took them over to the memory
care side of the building and started setting up the
games. We had a variety of different games for the seniors to increase their memory
strength as well as have things to do. Then in order to follow through with the project we
divided everyone up into pairs to help with each activity.
By the end of our activity, we accomplished making new friends and memories.
We made new connections the seniors living there as well as networking with the staff.
We also went around and put hearts on the seniors doors to celebrate Valentines Day.
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This was a humbling experience for us to be a part of and it helped solve the problem of
entertaining the seniors.
The value of our recommendation is that every group member learned a lot about
giving service. For some group members it taught them how giving a small amount of
time can make a big difference in someones day. Others learned that some elderly
people have special needs. However, we believe that the entire group learned how
rewarding service can be not only for themselves but also for the people that they serve.
Project Description

Wentworth at Willow Creek is an assisted living and memory care senior home.
Although it is a wonderful place for them to live, sometimes they do not get to see very
many new faces. This may be very difficult for some of the seniors and we wanted to
help them out with it. Our purpose was, we wanted to provide them with games to help
with their memory as well as give them new faces to see and new things to do.
Our first step was we got nine volunteers from company who were willing to
support and participate in helping the seniors after school on February 5, 2016. We all
met at the building inside the activities room where Parker, the activities director, gave
us some instructions. Then we were able to gather leapfrog, beanbag toss, puzzles, and
bowling supplies to help us with this project. With these things, we went over to the
memory care center and set everything up while the seniors were being entertained with
music.

We divided everyone up into pairs in order to have people at all the different
stations of activities. We had a difficult time getting the seniors to want to participate, but
we were able to get them someone to talk to and be around. The biggest hit that they
enjoyed was the

bean bag/leap frog

toss. We set up little

buckets a few feet

from the couch

where most of the

seniors were sitting.

Then we handed them

the beanbags and

asked them to try to

throw them in the

buckets. At first, they

did not think they

could make it, but with

the encouragement

of the company

students, they tried

and were able to make

them in.
After a couple of hours of these activities, we
ready for dinner. We helped set up all of the plates and silverware. Then we helped
move all of the seniors from the couches to their seats in

got

order to eat. We sat and talked with all

of

them for a while before the food actually came. Once

the dinner trays arrived we distributed them among all

of the seniors. It was a great way to help the staff and get to know the seniors better.
We were able to learn more about the seniors lives and help make them smile. After the
seniors finished eating, we cleaned up all the plates and put them back in the cart they
came in.
After dinner, we gathered everyone and had the company students dance for the
seniors. The seniors here really love music and to them it is entertaining to see dances.
Although it was not organized and did not look very good, it brought so many smiles to
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the seniors. Soon after this it was time for them to go to bed. We helped clean up all of
the supplies that we brought over and then said goodnight as they all went to their
rooms.
The last thing we did before leaving is take the hearts we brought that said
Happy Valentines Day and taped them to the doors of all the assisted living seniors.
This way when they woke up they found a cute heart on their door to help celebrate the
holiday. Then we grabbed all of our personal things and went home. Overall, every
group member went home feeling satisfied. Even though we knew that most of the
seniors would not remember our service (our group served in the memory care unit), we
still felt like it was worthwhile. It was worthwhile because even if they forgot we at least
made them happy for one afternoon. It was not just beneficial for the elderly thought;
group members also got a lot fun from this service project. I would say that every group
member learned from this experience.
Group Assets
We had two major strengths on our service project. The first was that we knew
how to act around people with disabilities after learning from communications two. The
second one was that we knew how to network.

The first one is how to act around

those with disabilities. This was very important and helpful since we did our service
project with seniors in memory care. Most of them has Alzheimers, which made them
act younger than they are. In the communications book it tells us how to act around
them. We knew that we had to be naturally
cordial, give them the same level as
respect, not be pushy, be patient, and to relax. Since we learned this previously in
company, we knew exactly how to act when we went to the project. In the
communications book it gave us all of these guidelines to make sure we make the
person feel comfortable as well as us. One of the examples it gave us from the book
was, Be naturally cordial. When introduced to a person with a disability, offer to shake
hands. (Alder, Elmhorst, & Lucas, Communicating at Work, 2013, 38).
Our second strength that really helped us during this project was networking.
Since Mariah has been volunteering there already, she knew someone who could help
us set up this project. There are many who are in charge of the memory care center, but
there are only two women in charge of the activities that happen with the seniors.
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Mariah was able to talk to them and ask them about setting up this project. The
importance of us using the networking skills from the communications book were, we
went out of our comfort zone to go ask these two women if we could come provide
services for the seniors. We were able to meet people who had career information and
advice. In the book it defines networking as, The process of deliberately meeting
people and maintaining contacts to get career information, advice, and leads-and in turn
to help others. (Alder, Elmhorst, & Lucas, Communicating at Work, 2013, p. 22). We
were also able to receive business cards if we wanted to pursue any further in their
business.
Group limitations

We had some limitations to this

project as well. In the communications book the definition for Horizontal communication
is, Messages between members of an organization with equal power. This is the
process of allowing employees of a company or organization to communicate with each
other (peer to peer). (Alder, Elmhorst, & Lucas, Communicating at Work, 2013, p.18).
During our project, our examples were, we had some difficulties with communicating
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with each member of the group. The importance of this was that it made the activities go
a little slower than planned.
The demonstration we provided was our
team struggled to use horizontal communication effectively in our service project. This
is evident when team members needed to improvise or adapt to an unknown situation.
Our lack of horizontal communication lead to overall slow reaction times, but luckily this
did not affect the service project that much.
The definition for downward communication is the process of allowing
management or people higher up on the chain of command to communicate directly
with their employees. An example of this from the communications book is job
instructions; an example of this is they are distributed from the superior down to the
employees. In the communications book it tells us that, Downward communications
occurs whenever superiors initiate messages to their subordinates. (Alder, Elmhorst, &
Lucas, Communicating at Work, 2013, p.15). This is something we used during our
project, because we were in charge and distributed all the information needed to the
rest of the group.
In this project, the team leaders sometimes struggled to convey a clear message
to all volunteers. A demonstration of this is the led slow reaction times and slow
transitions between activities. The importance of this is that a downside to this lack of
downward communication was the waste precious volunteer time. Even though this
affected the service project, it did not affected it in a major way and did not get in the
way of achieving the goals and priorities set for this service project.
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Recommendations:

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Our proposal is there

are definitely recommendations and tips that we can give to help improve this service
project in the future. These tips range from communication tips to project planning and
execution tips. Some specific remedies we found was first, a big tip that I can advise
any group in the future is to make sure to choose yours wisely. Remember the games
have to be challenging but you have to make sure that any elder no matter their age or
physical ability / limits can play each game. For example, some Elders because of their
physical limitations could not play our beanbag games.
Future recommendations is to plan a few extra minutes for transition time, not
only for your team but also because the elders take a few minutes to transition and get
going. Do not plan the project expecting to go according to the times you have. Things
change constantly and being prepared extra time will help.

Conclusion
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In summary, every member of our service team learned something from this
service project. This service project was challenging in a few ways. These challenges
include the challenge of communication (It was hard to communicate with some of the
elderly there because some of them ether had a hard time talking or were a little bit hard
of hearing).

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Another challenge our team

had to overcome was the challenge of serving food to the elderly. This was a challenge
because some of them had to have assistance when eating while others had certain
dietary restrictions. Some of the other things we had to work with were explaining what
was going on to all of the seniors.
In the end, our group had lots of fun and we gained many useful skills that they
can apply in other areas of their live. Through networking, we can find new opportunities
to be involved in seniors lives and with communications; we can converse with them at
any time. Overall, this service project was very challenging and very fun.

Works Cited
Elmhorst, Jeanne M., Ronald B. Adler, and Kristen Lucas. COMM 1010 Salt Lake
Community College. New York: Learning Solutions, 2013. Print.

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