As Kansas State University puts forward its strategic plan with emphasis on applied learning, how can our faculty prepare to engage with community and create stronger, efficient, mutually-beneficial relationships that enhance the student experience and fulfill a community need? One way is through service-learning.
In spring 2023, the Staley School of Leadership welcomed Lori Kniffin, former K-State instructor, to campus for a guest lecture on engaged learning experiences. We asked Lori to create a blog series to share more about key components and examples of service-learning. This is the fifth installment of a blog series: What is service-learning? where she and Robert G. Bringle reflect on educational outcomes of service-learning.
Why invest in service-learning?
There are many methods to teaching, and K-State is no stranger to the use of laboratories as a pedagogy. Laboratories require additional space—we all know that space is scarce and expensive; it requires additional teaching commitments of faculty; it raises issues about faculty teaching loads; it requires support staff like laboratory assistants and technicians; it requires continuing expenses for equipment and supplies; and, as if that weren’t scary enough, it raises serious issues about safety, toxins, poisons, pollution, and the ethical treatment of animals.
Why does an institution like K-State make that kind of investment in laboratories? We all are familiar with laboratories, we have been students in laboratory courses, and they are deeply ingrained in the academic culture. However, let’s think about why we have laboratories, with all of their expenses, resources, and issues? If you were asked to defend the presence of laboratories in the academy, how would you do that? Let me suggest that the answer might include the assertion that laboratories deliver certain types of educational outcomes that cannot be achieved through traditional teaching methods (e.g., lectures), and that is the reason that universities invest in and support laboratories.
By analogy, is there a similar case to be made for the newer pedagogy of service-learning? That is, is it possible that service-learning is becoming more and more prevalent in higher education around the world because it is a pedagogy that delivers certain types of educational outcomes that cannot be achieved through traditional teaching methods? Let me suggest to you that, like laboratories, service-learning is the best way, if not the only way, to achieve certain educational outcomes; and, there is accumulating evidence that service-learning courses are the best way to achieve those outcomes.
What are those unique educational outcomes that service-learning can deliver? We typically organize educational objectives associated with service-learning as three overlapping domains: academic learning, civic learning, and personal growth (see the previous blog in this series What is Service-Learning?). Usually, the academy is most concerned or solely concerned with academic learning as a cognitive outcome. Traditionally, the areas of civic learning and personal growth are of secondary interest or of no interest in the academy (“That’s not my job!”). Many in higher education are recognizing the value added by the other types of learning. Employers also express an interest in other types of learning that transcend the content of the major.
When faculty and staff are asked what knowledge, skills, and abilities they want their students to have when they graduate, the list of desirable attributes goes beyond content knowledge of the discipline or major. Consider this list of attributes.
- Communication skills
- Conflict resolution skills
- Social responsibility
- Valuing democratic ideals
- Self-efficacy
- Tolerance for ambiguity
- Valuing human dignity and human rights
Consider this a partial list. Would you like to see any of these attributes in graduates of your institution and your department? Of course, you want your students to have good academic knowledge and skills. However, in addition, many academics and employers also want their graduates to be well-prepared for careers, for successful and productive lives, and for making positive contributions to their communities.
I (Bob) am very fond of this quote by David Mathews: “Why do we need more than a vocational education? In part because we live more than a vocational life: we live a larger civic life, and we have to be educated for it.” What do you think would be a civic-minded graduate in your field? What is a civic-minded history major? A civic-minded business major? A civic-minded biology major? How can you intentionally teach toward that outcome? Service-learning is increasingly popular because of the realization that, when optimally implemented, it is one of the best ways to achieve those broader learning outcomes at the same time that academic learning is improved and student motivation is enhanced.
Additional evidence demonstrates the value of service-learning. Here we highlight a few of many studies on the pedagogy:
- Kuh (2008) identified service-learning as a high-impact practice.
- Service-learning students experienced a greater sense of coursework relevance to career aspirations; enhanced critical thinking abilities; increased positive attitudes toward social responsibility; and strong contributions to civic knowledge, attitudes and values, and identity (Hatcher et al., 2017).
- Celio et al. (2011) found service-learning to be positively associated with improved attitudes towards self, school, learning and civic engagement.
- Yorio & Ye (2012) show positive outcomes between service-learning and deepened understanding of social issues, personal insight, and cognitive development.
- Lastly, Conway et al. (2009) found strengthened academic, personal, social, and citizenship domains in pre-collegiate, collegiate, and adult students who engage in service-learning.
Like laboratory, service-learning requires resources such as time, funding, and additional commitments from faculty, students and community members. However, there is evidence that demonstrates service-learning produces educational outcomes that are needed in our students and communities.
References
Bringle, R. G., Brown, L., Hahn, T. W., & Studer, M. (2019). Pedagogies and civic programs to develop competencies for democratic culture and civic learning outcomes. Bordón. Revista de Pedagogía, 71(3), 27-4.
Bringle, R. G., & Clayton, P. H. (2012). Civic education through service-learning: What, how, and why? In L. McIlrath, A. Lyons, & R. Munck (Eds.), Higher education and civic engagement: Comparative perspectives (pp. 101-124). Palgrave.
Bringle, R. G., & Clayton, P. H. (2021). Civic learning: A sine qua non of service learning. Frontiers in Education, 6, 606443.
Celio, C. I., Durlak, J., & Dymnicki, A. (2011). A meta-analysis of the impact of service-learning on students. Journal of Experiential Education, 34, 164-181.
Conway, J. M., Amel, E. L., & Gerwien, D. P. (2009). Teaching and learning in the social context: A meta-analysis of service learning’s effects on academic, personal, social, and citizenship outcomes. Teaching of Psychology, 36, 233-245. http://doi.org/10. 1080/00986280903172969
Hatcher, J. A., Bringle, R. G., & Hahn, T. W. (2017) (Eds.). Research on student civic outcomes in service learning: Conceptual frameworks and methods. Stylus.
Kuh, G. D. (2009). High-impact educational practices. Association of American Colleges and Universities.
Yorio, P. L., & Ye, F. (2012). A meta-analysis on the effects of service-learning on the social, personal, and cognitive outcomes of learning. Academy of Management Learning & Education, 11(1), 9-27.
About the authors
Robert G. Bringle, Ph.D., Phil.D., is currently Chancellor’s Professor Emeritus of Psychology and Philanthropic Studies and Senior Scholar in the Indiana University Indianapolis Center for Service and Learning. He served as Executive Director of CSL from 1994-2012. His scholarly interests for service learning and civic engagement include student and faculty attitudes and motives, educational outcomes, institutionalization, and assessment issues. Dr. Bringle was awarded the Thomas Ehrlich Faculty Award for Service Learning, the Distinguished Research Award from the International Association for Research on Service-Learning and Community Engagement, and an honorary doctorate from The University of the Free State, South Africa.
Lori E. Kniffin, Ph.D., is an assistant professor of leadership at Fort Hays State University. She teaches a variety of courses including undergraduate and graduate courses through in-person and virtual modalities. Her teaching and research interests include collective leadership development, civic leadership, service-learning and community engagement, and qualitative research methods, and critical leadership studies. Prior to her time at FHSU, Lori served as a community engagement professional at UNC Greensboro and was named the 2019 Civic Engagement Professional of the Year by North Carolina Campus Compact. She was also an administrator and instructor for Kansas State University in the Staley School of Leadership from 2010-2016.
