Service-Learning Faculty Institute Ithaca College

Dr Edward ZlotkowskiMay 12-13, 2015

THE SCHOLARSHIP OF ENGAGEMENT

I am convinced that…the academy must become a more vigorouspartner in the search for answers to our most pressing social, civic,economic, and moral problems, and must reaffirm its historic commitment to what I call the scholarship of engagement.

The scholarship of engagement means connecting the rich resourcesof the university to our most pressing social, civic, and ethical problems…Campuses would be viewed by both students and professors not as isolated islands, but as staging grounds for action.

The scholarship of engagement also means creating a special climatein which the academic and civic cultures communicate more continuously and creatively with each other.

Ernest Boyer (1996), The Journal of Public Service and Outreach

Organizational Policies &

Sustainability

Service-Learning

VolunteerismFaculty Public Research & Service

Shared Resources

Extension Services & Non-Credit Programs

Civic Awareness & Deliberative

Dialogue

Internships & Practica

Circle of Higher EducationCivic Engagement

Initiatives

IC Service Learning Definition

Service Learning at Ithaca College is a course-based, credit- bearing educational experience in which students participate in an organized service activity that meaningfully addresses community-identified needs and then critically reflect on this service activity to further understand course content, more broadly appreciate the academic discipline, and significantly enhance their sense of civic responsibility.

(Ithaca College)

IC Service Learning (SL) Designation

1. Should adhere to the Institution’s recognized service learning definition.2. Disciplinary Skills are Applied and Practiced: The experience involves the application of concepts and knowledge learned in the students’ regular coursework, in a real-world environment. 3. Faculty mentoring is consistent: The experience involves significant, on-going mentoring by faculty throughout the experience.…4. Learning is purposeful and measurable: The experience is purposeful, designed in advance with clear goals and explicit, measurable learning outcomes….5. Critical reflection is an essential component: The experience provides opportunities for reflection about what and how the student is learning....These opportunities for reflection can enhance students’ ability to apply knowledge, and to evaluate their intellectual growth, metacognitive understanding, and implications for future experiences. 6. Student responsibility moves beyond a course grade in a way that can be measured: The experience requires students to be responsible for more than a course grade, and to be responsible to people other than the professor. That is, the outcomes of these experiences should have a life outside the context of the course.7. Community voice and perspective must be integrated into each criterion: The quality and longevity of service learning necessitates ongoing and responsive inclusion of community partners’ perspectives and voices throughout the processes of design, execution, and outcome assessment.

(Ithaca College)

Service-Learning Characteristics

• Meets assessable learning objectives (2, 3, 4)

• Involves structured reflection or analysis (2, 3, 5)

• Is based upon principles of campus-community partnership and reciprocity (6, 7)

•Involves experience with a community-based organization or group suitable for promoting civic learning (1, 6)

Public Engagement

Personal Contact& Direct Service

Problem-solving /Asset-

creating Projects

Research as

Resource

Service-Learning’s Academic Value

• Promotes the Utilization of Skills• Promotes Probing of Theories and Concepts• Balances Deductive and Inductive Inquiry• Stretches the Moral Imagination• Provides an Opportunity for Engaged Research• Helps Answer the “Why do I?” Question

What the Research Shows

“The method people naturally employ to acquire knowledge is largely unsupported by traditional classroom practice. The human mind is better equipped to gather information about the world by operating within it than by reading about it, hearing lectures on it, or studying abstract models of it.”

The Santa Fe Institute, The Mind, the Brain and Complex Adaptive Systems (1995)

What We Know About Learning

• The learner creates his or her learning actively & uniquely

• Learning is about making meaning for each individual by establishing and reworking patterns & connections

• Every student learns all the time, both with us & despite us

• Direct experience decisively shapes individual understanding for each learner

• Learning occurs best when people are confronted with a compelling and identifiable problem

• Beyond stimulation, learning requires reflection

• Effective learning is social and interactive

Peter Ewell, “Organizing for Learning,” AAHE Bulletin, Dec. 1997

Faculty & Students

“Colleges and universities today show an increasing disparity between faculty and students…What suffers as a consequence is the learning process itself - an observation that pervades in numerous national reports…Unfortunately, the natural differences in learning patterns exhibited by new students are often interpreted by faculty as deficiencies. What may be happening, then, is a fundamental ‘mismatch’ between the preferred styles of faculty and those of students.”

Charles Schroeder, “New Students – New Learning Styles,” Change (Sept.-Oct. 1993)

Even At Harvard

“…I assumed that most important and memorable academic learning goes on inside the classroom, while outside activities provide a useful but modest supplement. The evidence shows that the opposite is true: learning outside of classes…is vital. …Those students who make connections between what goes on inside and outside the classroom report a more satisfying college experience.”

Richard Light, Making the Most of College (2004)

The Difference That Service-Learning Makes

“There is an empirical fit between our goals for students and the outcomes of service-learning. If we want students who are lifelong learners, can use what they know, and have a capacity for critical analysis, then programs like service-learning, which help them construct knowledge from experience and reflection, should form the core of their educational experience.”

Eyler & Giles, Where’s the Learning in Service-learning? (1999)

How Service Learning Affects Students: HERI 2000 Principal Findings

• “Service participation shows significant positive effects on 11 outcome measures: academic performance (GPA, writing skills, critical thinking skills), values…, self-efficacy, [and] leadership...”

• “Performing service as part of a course … adds significantly to the benefits associated with community service …”(original emphasis)

• “Qualitative findings suggest that service learning is effective because it facilitates four kinds of outcomes: an increased sense of personal efficacy, an increased awareness of the [surrounding world], an increased awareness of one’s personal values, and increased engagement in the classroom experience.”

Service-Learning and Retention

“…participation in service-learning courses affects students’ plans for continued study, and…the academic aspects of the service-learning course are important in accounting for this effect.”

Gallini & Moely, “Service-Learning and Engagement, Academic Challenge, and Retention,” MJCSL (Fall 2003)

The Four Quadrants of Service-Learning Program Design

Student-Centered Structured Learning

Community-Centered Unstructured Learning

AcademicExpertise

FocusCommon Good

FocusService-Learning

Faculty Students

Institution Community Partners

Faculty Challenges

• Choosing an Appropriate Project• Designing Multi-Level Reflection

Strategies• Turning Service Activities into Scholarship• Making a Personal Commitment

Student Roles in Service-Learning Learning: A Pyramid of Engagement

Routine Operational Responsibilities

Students as Project Leaders

Faculty-Student Course Collaboration

Students as Engaged

Scholars

Level of Intellectual E

ngagement

Student Empowerment and Democratic Practice

“On a more theoretical level, service-learning is a pedagogy that emphasizes democratic development…and thus is a natural fit with a course that employs a democratic learning process from course creation through implementation. The goals of both service-learning and democratic development are met to a greater extent when the two are employed together in the same course than when employed individually.”

Bunn, Elansary & Bowman, Students as Colleagues (2006)

Possible projects identified

Faculty and

partner(s)discuss/design

projects

In-classintroduction of projects/

student preparation and

pre-service reflection

On-site Orientation(possible

project contract)

Project implementation

and ongoing reflection

Project completion

(product delivery)/presentations and

post-service reflection

Faculty-partnerdebriefing and

project assessment

Project portfolio created and filed

SERVICE-LEARNING PARTNERING ROLES

1. Initial identification of possible projectsFaculty Role:

Partner Role: Service-Learning Center Role:

2. Project designFaculty Role:

Partner Role: Service-Learning Center Role:

3. Project introduction and student preparation Faculty Role:

Partner Role: Service-Learning Center Role:

4. On-site orientationFaculty Role:

Partner Role: Service-Learning Center Role:

5. During the project’s implementation

Faculty Role:Partner Role: Service-Learning Center Role:

6. Upon completion of the projectFaculty Role:Partner Role: Service-Learning Center Role:

7. Upon completion of the course Faculty Role:Partner Role: Service-Learning Center Role:

8. Creating a project/course portfolio Faculty Role: Partner Role: Service-Learning Center Role:

Civic Engagement

“Civic engagement means working to make a difference in the civic life of our communities and developing the combination of knowledge, skills, values, and motivation to make that difference….A morally and civically responsible individual recognizes himself or herself as a member of larger social fabric and therefore considers social problems to be at least partly his or her own…”

Thomas Ehrlich, Civic Responsibility and Higher education (2000)

EXAMPLES OF CIVIC COMPETENCIES

• Eloquent listening• Non-abrasive argumentation• Suspending judgment• Building consensus• Organizing for action

Reflection Tools• Journals

• Reflective papers

• Integrative research papers

• Integrative exam questions

• Focused in-class discussions

• Oral presentations (group and individual)

• Electronic contributions: blogs, wikis, blackboard

Evaluation & Assessment

1. Evaluation of the quality of student work (i.e., “Grading”)

2. Assessment as a diagnostic tool and as research

3. Assessment as institutional measurement

RUBRIC TO ASSESS ACADEMIC SERVICE-LEARNING REFLECTION PAPERS

Adapted from Rubric Developed by Dr. Barrett Brenton, St. John’s University (NYC) and Campus Compact

Graded

Dimensions of Quality (Criteria) NOVICE [Grade Range F – D]

APPRENTICE[Grade Range C]

PROFICIENT[Grade Range B]

DISTINGUISHED[Grade Range A]

Yes

AWARENESS OF PURPOSE OF SERVICE

Student demonstrateslimited awareness ofthe purpose of service and obtaining AS-L credit.

Student expressesawareness of the purpose of service and a one-on-one connection with the experience, but it is not applied.

Student expressesempathy and/or awareness of personal role in service and applies it to a connection with solutions and the bigger picture.

Student expresses and acts out personal role in service and applies the experience to developing solutions.

Yes

CRITICAL THINKING

Student accepts things at face value,as if all opinions werecreated equal.Opinions are statedwithout argument.

Student accepts mostthings at face value,as if most opinions werecreated equal.Opinions are statedwith limited argument.

Student begins to arguefor conclusions based onobjective evidence that express concrete arguments.

Student expresses an abstractlevel of responding which requiresobjective evidence. Theydemonstrate awareness ofdifferent perspectives, andweigh evidence to successfully argue for a conclusion/opinion.

Yes

APPLYING THE AS-L EXPERIENCE TO THE ACADEMIC KNOWLEDGE BASE AND OBJECTIVES OF THE COURSE

Student does not apply the academic knowledge base and objectives of the course to the service experience.

Student expresses someconnection between the academic knowledge base and objectives of the course and the service experience.

Student develops aperspective built upon the academic knowledge base and objectives of the course that is linked to the service experience.

Student creates their own academic perspective infused with the knowledge base and objectives of the course and applies it to the service experience beyond the curriculum.

Optional

RESPONSIBILITY TO COMMUNITY

Student demonstratesa limited awareness ofpersonal responsibilityto community.

Student expresses insightinto community issuespertinent to the serviceproject and integrates apersonal sense of responsibility to participating in a solution but does not apply that knowledge.

Student acknowledges a responsibility to community regarding issues pertinent to the service and expresses a commitment to working towards specificsolution(s).

Student acknowledges aresponsibility to communityregarding issues pertinent to the service and expresses a commitment to working towards specific solutions. In addition, student gets others involved.

Optional

IMPACT ON STUDENT’S PERSONAL LIFE

Student expressesvery limited or no connection between service and self.

Student expresses aconnection between service and self.

Student expresses howthey could change as aresult of the service.

Student expresses change(s) in self because of the service.

Optional

[INSTITUTIONAL VALUES AND MISSION]

Student demonstratesa limited connectedness of the service experience to [institutional values]

Student expresses someconnection between [institutional] values and service.

Student expressesempathy and awareness ofpersonal role in [public engagement and problem-solving as related to institutional mission].

Student fully incorporates the [institution’s mission of public leadership] through application of reflection on the service experience and creates their own perspective based on both theory and experience

Next-Century Learning “…today, people worldwide need a whole series of

new competencies…but I doubt such abilities can be taught solely in the classroom, or be developed solely by teachers. Higher order thinking and problem-solving skills grow out of direct experience…they require more than a classroom activity. They develop through active involvement and real-life experiences in workplaces and the community.”

John Abbott, “The Search for Next-Century Learning,” AAHE Bulletin (March 1996)