scholarly journals Factors Leading to Sustainable Social Impact on the Affected Communities of Engineering Service Learning Projects

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrew G. Armstrong ◽  
Christopher A. Mattson ◽  
Randy S. Lewis
Keyword(s):  
Service Learning ◽  
Social Impact ◽  
Engineering Programs ◽  
Project Outcomes ◽  
Student Teams ◽  
Learning Programs ◽  
The Usa ◽  
Service Learning Projects ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Learning Projects

Abstract University engineering programs across the USA engage in service learning projects. These projects involve student teams designing and implementing products or solutions for communities in need, often in developing nations. There has been much research done relating to pedagogy and the impact of these programs on student learning. However, less research has been done on measuring the impact of these programs on the affected communities. This paper examines factors that practitioners believe are related to successfully delivering a desirable and transferable solution to affected communities. The authors identified 46 distinct factors from the literature that implicitly or explicitly are suggested to contribute to successful project outcomes. Formed as postulates in this paper, these 46 factors have been separated into 5 categories to assist understanding and implementing these factors into service learning programs. Lastly, different methods of analyzing and measuring project success and impact are discussed. Future methods for proving the viability of the 46 postulates are discussed as well.

scholarly journals Improving the Long-Term Sustainability of Service-Learning Projects: Six Lessons Learned from Early MIT IDEAS Competition Winners

2011 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 19-29
Author(s):  
Diana Jue
Keyword(s):  
Service Learning ◽  
Lessons Learned ◽  
Community Partner ◽  
Target Populations ◽  
Student Teams ◽  
History Of ◽  
Service Learning Projects ◽  
Learning Projects ◽  
Ongoing Concern

An ongoing concern of service-learning projects is whether they can benefit target populations in the long-term. Too often, service-learning projects end before a real deliverable is presented to the community. At MIT, a short history of service-learning projects can be documented through the IDEAS Competition, an annual competition that awards small monetary prizes to student teams that have designed and implemented innovative projects to positively impact underserved communities. This article analyzes how winning projects of the first five IDEAS Competitions evolved or dissolved. From the experiences and wisdom of these early winners, this article offers six pieces of advice to students and academic institutions seeking to implement service-learning projects: 1) Seriously consider implementation from the beginning, 2) Be concrete and realistic in the short term, 3) Be flexible in the long-term, 4) Build a multidisciplinary team, 5) Collaborate with a solid community partner, and 6) Prepare for continuity.

scholarly journals Reimagining Service-Learning: Deepening the Impact of This High-Impact Practice

2019 ◽  
Vol 42 (3) ◽  
pp. 229-248 ◽  
Author(s):  
Karen L. Anderson ◽  
Margaret Boyd ◽  
Katherine Ariemma Marin ◽  
Kathleen McNamara
Keyword(s):  
Service Learning ◽  
Learning Outcomes ◽  
Liberal Arts ◽  
High Impact ◽  
Credit Hours ◽  
Service Learning Projects ◽  
Science Major ◽  
High Impact Practice ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Learning Projects

Background: Service-learning has historically been seen as a high-impact practice that empowers undergraduates to develop essential learning outcomes. Most service-learning discussed within the literature occurs as a required element of a credit-bearing academic course. Purpose: This study explored what happens when service-learning is reimagined to be disconnected from a specific course and credit hours, and available via application to all undergraduates regardless of the liberal arts/science major or year in the college. Methodology/Approach: HyperRESEARCH was used to identify themes and categories from 45 sets of weekly reflections submitted by 36 participants engaged in reimagined service-learning projects across five semesters. Findings/Conclusions: Key findings reveal that not only do undergraduates develop essential learning outcomes as delineated in the existing literature, but in many cases, their understandings, and abilities to execute these skills, are deepened when service-learning is reimagined. Findings also reveal that undergraduates may experience service-learning differently depending upon year in college. Implications: Results from this study suggest that practitioners should investigate ways to reimagine service-learning, with specific emphasis placed on the differential ways college students at various stages in their undergraduate career experience, and learn from, service-learning.

scholarly journals Service Learning Programs with Juvenile Offenders

2020 ◽  
Vol 13 (2) ◽  
pp. 88
Author(s):  
Mark Dickerson ◽  
Randy Fall ◽  
Roxanne Helm-Stevens
Keyword(s):  
Juvenile Offenders ◽  
Service Learning ◽  
Juvenile Courts ◽  
School Students ◽  
Public School Students ◽  
Career Information ◽  
College And University ◽  
Learning Programs ◽  
Service Learning Projects ◽  
Learning Projects

While prior research on service-learning has established the benefits for participating college and university students, more recent research has attempted to explore the value of service-learning projects for the recipients of the service-learning projects, typically public-school students. This study endeavors to extend this research to a special subset of this population by examining the outcome of a 6-week service-learning project in an alternative educational setting for juvenile offenders. This service-learning project involved teams of four to five university business school students presenting a life skills curriculum to two classrooms of students who have been adjudicated through the juvenile courts. We administered an optional questionnaire to all participating students as a pretest and posttest, asking about their knowledge and skills in career readiness. We found statistically significant increases in ratings from pretest to posttest. Analyzed individually, all 28 items showed statistically significant improvements from pretest to posttest. Scales created from the items were also statistically significant, with the greatest change in items measuring Goals. We interpret these findings as an indication that adjudicated youth have a substantial need and interest in career information and training.

Ethnographic Service Learning: An Approach for Transformational Learning

Journal ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 6 ◽  
Author(s):  
Melanie A. Medeiros ◽  
Jennifer Guzmán
Keyword(s):  
Service Learning ◽  
Undergraduate Students ◽  
Transformational Learning ◽  
Liberal Arts ◽  
The United States ◽  
Field Methods ◽  
The Social ◽  
Service Learning Projects ◽  
Transformational Experiences ◽  
Learning Projects

Trends in higher education pedagogy increasingly point to the importance of transformational experiences as the capstone of liberal arts education. Practitioners of ethnography, the quintessential transformational experience of the social sciences, are well-positioned to take the lead in designing courses and term projects that afford undergraduate students opportunities to fundamentally reshape their understanding of the social world and their own involvement within it. Furthermore, in the United States, colleges and universities have become proponents of service learning as a critical component of a holistic educational experience. In this article, we describe how service learning can be incorporated into training students in ethnographic field methods as a means to transformational learning and to give them skills they can use beyond the classroom in a longer trajectory of civic participation. We discuss strategies, opportunities, and challenges associated with incorporating service learning into courses and programs training students in ethnographic field methods and propose five key components for successful ethnographic service learning projects. We share student insights about the transformational value of their experiences as well as introduce some ethical concerns that arise in ethnographic service-learning projects.

Service-Learning Projects: Meeting Community Needs

2006 ◽  
Vol 18 (4) ◽  
pp. 315-322 ◽  
Author(s):  
Beverly A. Peterson ◽  
Jean Yockey ◽  
Peggy Larsen ◽  
Diana Twidwell ◽  
Kathy Jorgensen
Keyword(s):  
Service Learning ◽  
Community Needs ◽  
Service Learning Projects ◽  
Learning Projects

scholarly journals Reflect, Analyze, Act, Repeat: Creating Critical Consciousness through Critical Service-Learning at a Professional Development School

2018 ◽  
Vol 8 (3) ◽  
pp. 148 ◽  
Author(s):  
P. Andrews ◽  
Susan Leonard
Keyword(s):  
Professional Development ◽  
Service Learning ◽  
Critical Consciousness ◽  
Professional Development School ◽  
Engaged Scholarship ◽  
Traditional Service ◽  
Community Engaged Scholarship ◽  
Service Learning Projects ◽  
Learning Projects

Universities engage students in traditional service-learning projects that often yield “good feelings”, even a savior mentality, but typically leave the root causes of social justice issues unexamined and untouched. In contrast to traditional service-learning, critical service-learning bridges this gap with an explicit focus on justice and equity, situating scholars’ work with the community rather than for it. A public university in the southeast offered a doctoral course that focused on critical service-learning in the context of a professional development school partnership. Designed as an ethnographic multi-case study, each graduate student in the on-site course represents a case. Data collection included interviews, observations, written reflections, and artefacts. The analysis revealed that developing critical service-learning projects with educators—rather than for them—supported participants’ critical consciousness. Findings and discussion highlight that facilitating community-engaged scholarship through critical service-learning impacts graduate students and middle-grades educators’ research interests, work, and future directions.

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