(Ed's note: The following letter was sent to Dr. Geoffrey N. Gordon, superintendent of schools, and is printed here at the writer's request.)

As a parent of two sons (one at Weber and the other at Daly) and a high school counselor by profession, I'm an avid reader of any news regarding the Port Washington Schools. I recently came upon an article that quoted your support for expanding the community service requirement for graduation from Schreiber. In my opinion you're going in the wrong direction and in the process, are doing a disservice to the Port community. Community service once referred to voluntary efforts by individuals to provide free services to others in the community. The issue I'm referring to here is a relatively new and disturbing concept: Mandatory community service. This program requires students to provide uncompensated service to organizations and agencies in order to earn a high school diploma. This kind of program is seriously misguided and inappropriate because it violates our fundamental beliefs about the nature of helping others. Here are six reasons why:

1. Forcing students to work for free is the wrong way to go about instilling good citizenship skills in young people. When you compel adolescents to do community service, you are not teaching them about citizenship...you are teaching them that, we, as educators, can force you to do what we want. Moral and ethical issues should not be founded on authority. Even such leading proponents of national and community service programs as Amitai Etzioni, a renowned professor of sociology at George Washington University, is adamantly opposed to mandatory community service, stating that it "destroys respect for individual responsibility." He believes that public schools have moved beyond their mission when they make community service mandatory.

2. The decision to serve has always been left to individual conscience and to the moral education of children by parents. It's the responsibility of each parent, not the school, to teach our children ethics and what he/she owes to the community.

3. There are fundamental differences between mandatory community service and any other school required activity or out of school activity, such as homework, take home exams, and so on. A student is not laboring for or providing an uncompensated service to another party while performing a homework assignment or engaging in any other school mandated activity. And, unlike other mandated school activities, mandatory community service is supervised by non-school personnel.

4. We know that adolescents have been doing charitable work for generations, and will continue to do so. And when they do voluntary community service, they do so at the service organization of their choosing, no matter how controversial and still protect their rights to keep their charitable activities and associations confidential. Mandatory community service not only takes away their right to choose whether or not to engage in charitable activities, but it removes their right to privacy since students must reveal the organization for which they perform service.

5. Individuals who don't do community service may have good reasons, such as needy students who must earn an income, students who help care for younger siblings and/or grandparents, disabled students, athletic commitments, etc.

6. If we can justify requiring mandatory community service to promote citizenship, could we not also require peer tutoring and/or peer counseling to promote altruism...or membership in extracurricular activities to promote a well-rounded education? Were does it stop? The point is that the decision to perform charitable work through service to others must be between an individual and his/her conscience. It must not be imposed by the school system no matter how laudable the purpose.

In conclusion, mandatory community service may be politically correct, but it is educationally and morally incorrect. This program diminishes the work of the truly generous and by coercing students to do good, it undermines, and in many ways destroys, the spirit of volunteerism. Mandatory community service crosses the line on an issue that is the moral property of individuals and their families. The decision to serve others must come from an individual's heart and conscience, not an educational edict.

Volunteerism is like patriotism: Impose it and you poison it.

I urge you to reconsider your position on the issue.

Thank you for taking the time to read my letter. I look forward to hearing from you.

Wesley Berkowitz, PhD