Achieving effective integration of service experiences and course learning
Abstract
Service-learning combines service with learning in intentional ways. Volunteer activities without a learning component are equally important, but the two approaches are fundamentally different activities with different objectives. This effective practice offers a set of principles for higher education service-learning as documented by Kim Smith, the service-learning faculty coordinator at Portland Community College in Portland, Oregon, and was submitted in July 2004.Issue
Integrating community service with academic study to enrich learning, teach civic responsibility, and strengthen communities requires a deliberate and planned approach in order to fulfill the standards of service-learning.Action
The following guidelines are culled from national service-learning best practices documents (See Resources section) and from communications with Portland Community College faculty, staff, and community partners.
Learning Objectives
- Instructors clearly communicate service-learning objectives to students.
- Instructors engage students in establishing or modifying objectives to fit their personal learning goals.
- Instructors establish criteria for the selection of service placements related to the learning objectives.
- Instructors and students communicate learning objectives to community partners.
- Instructors and community partners collaborate to match learning objectives and service opportunities.
- Credit is earned for the learning that students demonstrate, not for the service itself.
- Instructors and community partners orient students to service expectations, issues addressed, populations served, and strategies for success.
- Community partners and experienced students participate in orientations on campus and at the sites.
- Students engage in responsible and challenging actions that meet community needs.
- Students find placements with organizations that provide excellent volunteer supervision and that support and understand service-learning.
- Service projects are designed through collaboration between community partners, faculty, and students.
- Students honor commitments they make to community partners.
- Students contact sites early in the quarter.
- Community contacts respond quickly to student inquiries.
- Instructors are aware of minimum hours needed for effective service at sites.
- Faculty and community partners encourage students to continue serving beyond the class requirements.
- Instructors and community partners use information on the service-learning agreement to manage risk, facilitate ongoing communication, clarify expectations and communicate learning objectives.
- Instructors, students, and community partners provide feedback to each other through dialogue, evaluation summaries, and reflection summaries.
- Instructors help students reflect on their service, examine issues raised through service, and articulate linkages between their service experiences and course objectives.
- When possible, in courses where service-learning is optional, instructors include other students in reflection on the issues raised through service.
Context
Service-learning at Portland Community College began in 1996 as a grassroots movement with a number of faculty from different disciplines, including English and the social sciences. Since then, faculty coordinators have actively recruited faculty from different departments, creating sought-after diversity in the program. Faculty at Portland Community College connect their course material to the local community using a wide variety of engaging methods. In courses with a service-learning option or requirement, students can apply their learning to community issues and challenges as they also reflect on underlying social problems, community problem-solving, and what it means to be an engaged community member.Outcome
The distinctive element of service-learning is that it enhances the community through the service provided, but it also has powerful learning consequences for the students or others participating in providing a service.
Service-learning helps students:
- Better understand course material
- Get to know their communities
- Explore values, ethics, leadership and civic engagement
- Appreciate their ability to make a difference by participating in community problem-solving
Posted On
July 20, 2004For More Information
Resources
Principles of Good Practice for Combining Service and Learning. Honnet, E.P., and S.J. Poulen. (1989). A Wingspread Special Report. Racine, WI: The Johnson Foundation, Inc.
This is the product of a two-year process by experienced practitioners to articulate what they learned and discovered to be the best practices for combining community service with student learning and development. Finalized in the spring of 1989 at the historic Wingspread Conference, hosted by the Johnson Foundation, the work represents the collaborative effort of more than seventy-five national and regional organizations committed to community service and experiential education. The Principles have since been regarded as the foundation for all effective service-learning programs by schools and campuses across the nation.
Principles Of Good Practice In Community Service Learning Pedagogy. Jeffrey Howard. (1993). Community Service Learning In The Curriculum. Praxis I, A Faculty Casebook On Community Service Learning. OCSL Press. Ann Arbor, Michigan.
Prepared by Jeffrey Howard of the University of Michigan; offers a set of principles to insure full integration of students' service experiences and course learning.