Service Learning

Service Learning: Reflective Essay

The service-learning project that I chose to participate in was arm-knitting scarves for the battered women’s shelter. Before making this decision, I did a little bit of research on battered women shelters. I had never heard of them before. Although the title of the shelter seems pretty self explanatory, I decided that understand whom I was helping and how it was affecting them was important. I felt as though knowing more about this topic would me to connect more in depth and make a better connection between myself and my goal of helping somebody and making a difference.

After looking at a few websites online, I discovered that battered women shelters were homes for women who had been abused or assaulted and were ready to escape and get back on their own two feet. By providing these types of facilities to women, their goal is to save lives and help women escape the traumatizing events of which they have been involved in. Their website shares make statistical facts about the abuse that women face in America today. According to The Joyful Heart Foundation website, One in three women report being physically or sexually abused by a husband or boyfriend at some point in their lives. When I read that line on the website, I was shocked. I had no idea that many women were being put through such events. The website also shared that every two minutes in the United States, someone is sexually assaulted.

Once reading and learning about these shelters and how they helped women with such problems, I was automatically drawn to do something nice for these women. I know that abused women feel worthless and like nobody cares. When I was a junior in high school, my sister got herself into an abusive relationship. She shut herself out from the rest of the world because he convinced her that he was the only one that would ever love her. Although reaching out to her was painful because all I received in return was rejection, I realized that...