关于
选择休息 at SMU (AB) is an immersive week of hands-on service, 领导建立, and relationship building supplemented with education 和反射. It qualifies for 社区参与 Proficiency upon completion. Each trip focuses on a particular social issue, and immersion in that issue begins long before the trip itself. Students educate themselves and each other, then do hands-on work with relevant organizations.
The objective of 选择休息 is to provide an opportunity for students to learn about the problems faced by marginalized groups with whom they may have had little or no direct contact through a complete cultural immersion. 通过社区服务项目, 他们能够反思, 讨论, and think critically about the social issues they face in a significant way. The intensity of the 选择休息 experience increases the likelihood that participants will transfer the lessons learned during their break back into their local communities.
AB @ SMU的历史
- AB at SMU was founded in 1987 on the SMU campus. It was started in the Chaplain's Office by then Chaplain Bob Cooper. The original three trips were called "work projects" and were offered in 1987-1988 in Brownsville, 德州, 新奥尔良，路易斯安那州, 和达拉斯, 德州. The sending of service trips on spring break was even earlier in the 1980s but outside a formal program.
- The program began having student leaders in 1989 and had a few ups and downs throughout the 1990s. It was strong in the mid to late 1990s and dipped somewhat around the early 2000s. 该项目在2010年再次壮大, skyrocketing from three trips in 2009 to nine trips in 2010. In 2015, 选择休息 at SMU peaked with over 20 trips and participated in its fourth year of international trips.
- 由于容量, 质量, 和资金, the 选择休息 program at SMU proudly sustains 8-12 trips per year in hopes of restructuring its program for more cohort-based partnerships and weekend trips beginning in 2019. The program went dormant 后 the 2020 pandemic and resumed operations in 2023. AB continues to grow and return to multiple trips throughout the year.