The community classroom: serving to learn and learning to serve

College Student Journal, Sept, 2001 by Laura Valerius, Michelle L. Hamilton

Service-learning is characterized by students' engagement in their local communities to apply and learn course concepts. Communities afford students venues in which to practice solving authentic real world problems with tangible outcomes. Service-learning includes collateral benefits to academic programs and to the local community. Students learn course objectives and the value of becoming contributing citizens of the greater community. In turn, communities benefit from students' provision of needed programs and services. However, without careful course construction, instructors run the risk of providing `feel-good' activities that are not linked to learning objectives. This article discusses the philosophy of students' "serving to learn and learning to serve" and provides examples of establishing meaningful links between course learning objectives and service-learning activities.

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Educational philosopher, John Dewey, at the beginning of the twentieth century expressed the need for experiential learning. The "great waste" in Education, according to Dewey was that learning was not connected to the surrounding community (Dewey, 1933). Real knowledge, Dewey would have agreed, comes only through the experience of learning that occurs within a meaningful context (Dewey, 1938/1963). Learning occurs when the learner constructs meaning from the interaction of knowledge and the experience.

Acquiring knowledge and demonstrating on paper and pencil exams is one way to look at academic learning. However, many cognitive scientists now believe that more meaningful and deep processing of information comes when students have the opportunity to apply course material (Bransford, Brown, & Cocking, 1999). This type of learning is constructed by the learner and is more than merely answering questions regarding facts and figures on an exam. The purpose of this article is to explore an alternative pedagogical method, service-learning, for constructing meaning in college courses. The authors will suggest benefits of service-learning and offer suggestions for developing meaningful learning outcomes.

A recent resurgence and interest has emerged in service-learning in university academic programs during the last decade (viz., Bringle, Games, & Malloy, 1999; Claus & Ogden, 1999; Eyler & Giles, 1999; Stanton, Giles, & Cruz, 1999; Zlotowski, 1997). The establishment in 1985 of Campus Compact, a coalition of college and university presidents committed to helping students develop the values and skills of citizenship through participation in public and community service (Stanton, et al., 1999), brought service-learning to the forefront of desirable educational practices.

What is Service Learning?

Although many definitions of service-learning appear in the literature (Stanton, 1987), for the purposes of this article, service-learning is defined as the "pedagogy of learning through service" (Chisholm, 1987, page 3). Service-learning is characterized by the students' engagement in their local communities to apply and learn course concepts. It is distinguished from volunteerism by the nature of the relationship of the students to the community. Volunteerism suggests a paternalistic, one-way relationship in which the community is the sole beneficiary of services, while not recognizing the benefits received by students (Stanton, et al., 1999). Communities afford students venues in which to practice solving authentic real world problems with tangible outcomes. Service-learning involves a reciprocal relationship between academic programs and community. Through service-learning, students go beyond merely observing problems to actually assuming the role and responsibility of contributing to the solution of the problem. From dealing with real world problems, students have the opportunity to recognize social injustices, appreciate the difficulties and advantages of working with people within the community from different backgrounds, and develop confidence and skills in their own abilities to critically think and solve problems. These are experiences that cannot be afforded within the confines of the university classroom.

Rather than colonizing community agencies for an academic unit's own purposes, service-learning offers collateral benefits to the community and respective programs. Communities benefit from the outcomes generated from students applying theory to community-specific problems concerns issues. These benefits can include assisting individuals with disabilities, helping persons from lower socioeconomic backgrounds identify resources, and developing strategies to enhance the environment in local communities.

The popularized "sage on the stage" is the prevalent pedagogical model in many college courses. Service-learning offers a non-traditional approach that shifts the role of the faculty member from expert to facilitator of learning. Knowledge sources become de-centralized as the focus of teaching moves from the instructor to key people within the local communities. Undergraduate students learn many lessons that cannot be taught in the classroom from their interactions with community leaders, program participants, clients, and elementary and secondary students. This model requires breaking out of the university walls and integrating within the community.