Community Service

Our Community Service Learning Program reinforces the gifts of a Marianist education, encouraging students to realize that they have the power to shape their communities.

The Riordan community focuses on a different social issue each month. We have two blood drives each school year, an AIDS Penny Drive, a Food Drive in November, and a Toy Drive in December. Some of our Spring events include supporting Our Lady of Nazareth Primary School in Nairobi, Kenya, and participating in an immersion home rebuilding trip to New Orleans.

Christian Community Service Learning Days

At Riordan, students are not required to complete Community Service as a personal graduation requirement. Instead, they work in collaboration with their peers in their House Mentor Groups to learn about the needs in their communities, explore ways in which they can help, and work together as a team to impact those communities. They have an opportunity to explore new services each Semester, and after four years at Riordan, students would have developed a portfolio of all of their service, leadership roles, pictures, and reflections.

These school-wide service days are set up with intentional pre-work Mentor Group agendas to investigate, analyze, and find a personal connection to each community and the type of service that they wish to conduct. Then the subsequent Mentor Group follows up with faith-centered and Marianist-focused contemplation and reflection and time to create a digital portfolio and share their development amongst peers. This gives each student an opportunity to find purpose in their service, joy in reflecting on the good that they do, and a structure in which to encourage personal fulfillment in pursuing service beyond high school.