one perceptive student wrote in his SST journal, which all students are

required to keep:

Going to bed tonight tired, but a good tired that has come from thoroughly extending myself in every intellectual, emotional, and physical way .... I pushed so hard to soak up every word from every speaker, pushed my own brain constantly for three days, examining, connecting and critiquing ideas presented to me .... And I've never learned so much in three days, never. I think my life/views/opinions have been altered permanently in some areas -- like thinking about poverty, and about dependence/service issues, and about entering a culture you have little knowledge of.42

Another student wrote later, during his service experience:

The idea of being part of the community before trying to do anything is powerful. It also runs contrary to many North American models of service (hit-and-run service). Not that it's easy to overcome our acts- based ideology of European Protestantism, but it is surely necessary. To be able to serve we must sacrifice something .... It needs to be a sacrifice more than simply the time involved. It needs to be a sacrifice of power. The power of being right.43

Prior to leaving for their service assignments, most SST leaders remind

students that service includes "being" and "understanding" and

"accompanying" as well as "doing.""Your assignment should be less a time of

performance than a time of study and reflection upon the meaning of

service," says one SST student handout titled "Background for Service

Experience."

Toward Transformation in a Postmodern World

achieving SST's goals of "disorienting" and thereby transforming students.

42_{David G. Roth, SST Journal, Summer 1997.}

43_{Peter Wiens, SST Journal, Summer 1997. According to a 1971 Goshen College}
analysis, the values best taught on SST were "international perspective,
service, and social concern" and the values most poorly taught were "purity
and academic excellence."See "The Study Service Trimester Abroad of Goshen
College," March 1971, 48, available in Mennonite Historical Library.

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