What is Service Learning? Learn and Serve America (2009) defines service learning as

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Community engagement and service learning: Educational strategies whose time has come Ellen Berger Rainville OTD, OTR/L, FAOTA Springfield College Springfield, MA www.butler.edu • Why Service Learning and OT? • Because it is different than traditional academic and fieldwork education, service learning can help students and faculty • Learn about social and cultural realities • Understand values and emotions • Appreciate their potential as agents of change • Expand the involvement of occupational therapists with their communities • Identify emergent and innovative areas of practice. • Because service learning/community engagement pedagogy differs from traditional occupational therapy fieldwork, specific information about how to develop and incorporate service learning in academic and fieldwork education programs is important at this time. • Unlike traditional OT fieldwork, the focus of service learning is on community identified needs rather than professionally defined knowledge, skill and attitudes. • OT educators and clinicians now have a model which affords our students genuine experience and authentic understanding of the struggles experienced by many people who are in need of help. How is Service Learning started?. • What is Service Learning? • Learn and Serve America (2009) defines service learning as • “a teaching and learning strategy that integrates meaningful community service with instruction and reflection to enrich the learning experience, teach civic responsibility and strengthen communities.” • OT education has long embraced the apprenticeship approach through carefully crafted fieldwork education. It is time to reach beyond the traditional academic and fieldwork models. • Community engagement and service learning offer OT educators and clinicians a valuable way to encourage thoughtful, community engaged practitioners and change agents. Clinicians who are familiar with their community understand the “real world” contexts where consumers function. • What is Community Engagement? • “Community engagement describes collaboration between institutions of higher education and their larger communities (local, regional/state, national, global) for the mutually beneficial exchange of knowledge and resources in a context of partnership and reciprocity.” The purpose is to: • enrich scholarship, research, and creative activity; • enhance curriculum, teaching and learning, • prepare educated, engaged citizens, • strengthen democratic values and civic responsibility, • address critical societal issues, and • contribute to the public good.” What are the outcomes? • Learn about community needs, listen, observe, ask… • Consider how an identified need might be met and what your resources are • Plan the actions that service learners might take in order to help • Take Action and provide the service(s) that you have planned • Reflect on what you see and hear and the impact your actions have on others • Demonstrate the impact of your service for the community • Evaluate and celebrate what you have done and what you have learned • In keeping with the literature, a multi-year program evaluation conducted by this researcher has consistently revealed the following outcomes of service learning: • Improved student competence in and comfort with community collaboration and consultation • Improved student understanding of the powerful influences of environments – physical, social, • political, etc. • Improved student ability to identify and solve problems in “non-textbook” situations • Helped students to see their occupational therapy roles as service provider, consultant, collaborator and advocate/change agent  • Supported students’ participation in integrated learning experiences • Improved awareness of personal, social, cultural and emotional responses, values, beliefs and attitudes • Developed new perspectives on empathy, sympathy, helping, and change • Made meaningful connections with new people While service project experiences can be as varied as their designers, it is often helpful to think of the service projects as direct service, indirect service, or research and advocacy. Types of Service Learning Programs: Problem-Based Service-Learning; students serve as consultants helping people address their own concerns Discipline-Based Service-Learning: students regularly reflect on their experiences through the lens of an academic class Capstone Courses: offered at the conclusion of an academic program or major where students synthesize their learning from the entire academic experience Community-Based Action Research: students may participate in a community-based action research project related to service Service Internships: expanding on both the concepts of traditional internships and service-learning, students may work intensively and often in a community setting. "Pure" Service-Learning: students, volunteers and others provide service to their communities as an intellectual activity. This type of service is often inter-professional ….” “It is interesting to consider how another person, having been shaped by different cultural and socioeconomic influences, might view circumstances and instances …quite differently. ..I have truthfully learned to keep my mind open to all environments, personalities and opinions. “ -service learning student References Bringle, R. G., & Hatcher, J. A. (2009). Innovative Practices in Service-learning and Curricular Engagement. New Directions for Higher Education, 147, 37-46. Heffernan, K. (2001) Fundamentals of Service-Learning Course Construction. RI: Campus Compact, . Eyler, J. & Giles, D.E. (1999). Where’s the learning in service learning? San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Eyler, J. (Fall 2000). What do we most need to know about the impact of service-learning on student learning? Michigan Journal of Community Service Learning, Special Issue, 11 - 17. Gitlow, L. & Flecky, K. (2005). Integrating disability studies into occupational therapy education using service learning. American Journal of Occupational Therapy. 59, 546 - 553. Hansen, A., Munoz, J., Crist, P.A., Gupta, J. Ideshi, R.I., Primeau, L.A., Tupe, D. (2007). Service Learning: Meaningful, Community-Centered Professional Skill Development for Occupational Therapy Students, Occupational Therapy in Health Care, 21, 25 - 49. www.butler.edu www.carnegiefoundation.org www.ecu.edu www.service learning.org “Everybody can be great... because anybody can serve. You don't have to have a college degree to serve. You don't have to make your subject and verb agree to serve. You only need a heart full of grace. A soul generated by love.” -Martin Luther King, Jr. For further information- erainvil@springfieldcollege.edu.