Service-Learning

Service-learning is a high-impact practice that offers students and instructors opportunities to engage with community partners in unique and beneficial relationships. These relationships open up new and exciting learning pathways through integrated, hands-on experiences. By participating in service-learning courses, students can actively apply what they learn in real-world settings, learn new skills, develop social responsibility, and connect with community members they might otherwise not get to know. In turn, they do work that gives back to their communities and promotes the common good.

Creating a service-learning course may seem intimidating, but resources abound to assist you in building effective service-learning experiences. As you explore and plan, you’ll keep in mind three key elements: integration, engagement, and reflection. 

Integration - Service-learning should be incorporated thoughtfully and intentionally in your overall course design. Integrating community engagement throughout the entirety of your course is essential for students to truly benefit from the unique characteristics of service-learning.

Engagement - The most meaningful and successful interactions between students and community partners will result from sustained and continual involvement. Although a one-time event, such as a “day of service,” can be beneficial to a community, it does not provide the relationship-building, skills development, and reflection opportunities that are typically embodied by a service-learning course.

Reflection - For students to truly move toward new perspectives, they need to grapple with their time spent in the community. Design intentional reflection questions for both in-class and out-of-class sessions.

Source: The Ohio State University

1. The two primary aims of service-learning should be to offer an intellectually rich educational experience for students and to address a significant community need.
2. The service-learning project should be well-integrated into the course content, so that students clearly see the relationship between the project and the academic goals of the course. They should also be able to understand why the experience has intellectual value.
3. Adequate in-class time should be allocated for the students to share, discuss, and analyze their service-learning experiences with other students in the class and with their professor.
4. The time commitment for completing the service-learning project and students' reflection on it should be flexible, appropriate, and in the best interests of everyone involved: students, faculty, and community partner.
5. Structured opportunities for analysis should be incorporated into the course requirements so that students may reflect critically on their experiences.
6. Students should receive some instruction in how "to read experience as a text" so that they learn to isolate pivotal experiences and analyze their significance. Students should also receive guidance in connecting the “text” of their experience to the other texts in the course, allowing their experience to illuminate or challenge their other readings.
7. Faculty should recognize that creating a viable service-learning project with a community partner takes time, commitment, and an understanding of the partner's point of view.
8. The community partner, not the faculty member, should identify what the community needs and the goals to which it aspires.
9. Collaborations between faculty and community partners are key to creating a service-learning project that is both intellectually rich and provides a real service to the community.
10. Final results of the service-learning project should be shared by the students with the community partner. End-of-the-semester oral presentations have been especially useful in bringing everyone involved in the project together. It is also a good way to celebrate the project's completion.

Source: University of Massachusetts Amherst

If you need more inspiration and guidance to create service-learning opportunities, these two toolkits can help walk you through the process and build opportunities that will change the lives of you, your students, and the community.

University of Louisville. Developing a Service-Learning Course. https://louisville.edu/communityengagement/additional-resources/HowtodevelopaServiceLearningcourse.pdf

University of Northern Georgia. Service-Learning Tool-kit. https://ung.edu/academic-engagement/_uploads/files/service-learning-tool-kit.pdf