“You can’t be part of a community and live in your own bubble,” stated Mrs. Pozzetti in a interview regarding the volunteer work and community service students of Portsmouth High School (PHS) are involved in. Does PHS tend to stay in its own, bubbled world, or is it involved with the surrounding community?

For multiple classes, including Ecology, students are required to complete a certain amount of time, which could range from 3 to 5 hours, volunteering. Most students who are required to volunteer tend to volunteer at the school itself, either collecting donations for plays and concerts, or recycling. The Peer Leadership Club, however, goes around Portsmouth doing a variety of services for the whole community.

The students of the Peer Leadership Club are asked to volunteer at five events, but there is no set amount of hours required. Most club members, however, complete around 100 hours of community service per year they’re part of the club. Events include, volunteering at soup kitchens, beach cleanups, tutoring at elementary schools, and more.

“There’s always room for improvement, but Portsmouth does a great job,” pointed out Mrs. Pozzetti. PHS has made a lasting impact on Portsmouth through the Peer Leadership Club and required hours for classes, but are football games and concerts enough to tie the gap between the PHS community and the surrounding Portsmouth community? While the students volunteering their time is very significant, the majority of PHS students aren’t as involved with the community as they could be.

The many opportunities for students to get involved are always open, which makes the problem seem more focused on whether or not the students want to. To find creative ideas to persuade students to volunteer is a difficult task, so it mostly depends on themselves and how important they find having a role in the whole community.

No matter the students that find volunteer work irrelevant, PHS still does an outstanding job finding ways to get more and more involved with the town.