This paper offers a historical theoretical discussion and practical perspective on the qualitative paradigm of inquiry referred to as Naturalistic Inquiry (Lincoln & Guba, 1985). Moreover, it endeavors to demonstrate the paradigm's versatility and usefulness when attempting to illuminate phenomena that specifically occur when students…

While literature on research methods abounds, little attention has been given to understanding how qualitative researchers and their approaches to research (i.e., the researcher's stance) shape what we know about global service-learning (GSL) and how we come to know what we know about GSL. Researchers often uncritically adopt a particular research…

Preparing special educators for the highest-need schools remains an ongoing challenge in urban districts across the United States. One university's collaborative community-based immersive partnership model, with emphasis on service learning, has demonstrated promising levels of impact on candidates' preparation as preservice teachers learning how…

The authors explore the challenges inherent in traversing the multiple boundaries between sociology and social work, and the academy and the community, by examining a service learning course on hunger and homelessness taught by two sociology professors and two social workers on the staff of a community service organization. The authors draw on…

This study evaluated the Memory Bridge Initiative (MBI), an educational, experiential program pairing high school students with older adults who have dementia. A qualitative, single group design with baseline and follow-up measures examined whether or not students would have a positive learning experience while gaining newfound appreciation and…

This qualitative study explores how 11 university students in a U.S. service-learning course in Belize understood and represented their identities during the project, particularly their use of "the tourist" as a construct to interpret their experiences. Drawing on literature in international service-learning (ISL) and tourism studies,…

In this paper, the author adopts the notion that working with children in some ways highlights the challenges of university-level pedagogy and research ethics; this is done by evaluating a service-learning course she conducted with undergraduate and graduate students that was based on children's urban geographies. In the course of this…

The author (a university instructor) and her community partner (a public school teacher) have collaborated in teaching an academic service-learning course in special education. This collaboration, the RAP (recreational activities project), was completed by university undergraduate students and young adults with cognitive impairment and/or…

The University of North Carolina Mobile Student Health Action Coalition (UNC MSHAC) at Chapel Hill, North Carolina is a voluntary service-learning program in which interdisciplinary teams of graduate level health professional students provide monthly home visits to isolated, community-dwelling elders with complex medical and social issues.…

In an effort to increase the quality and quantity of service-learning assessment, this article provides a brief rationale for engaging in service-learning assessment and reviews a selection of available tools for doing so. The paper includes a matrix that lists cognitive outcomes, including critical thinking and problem solving, and the…

Research studies on service learning and teacher education have concluded that one of the major challenges is the lack of assessment studies that document the impact of service learning on students' academic development. In this research study, the perceptions of 65 preservice teachers on service learning were assessed. The major goals of the…

Professional identity is a term used to describe both the collective identity of a profession and an individual's own sense of the professional role. This article draws from the literature exploring professional identity with attention to the issues of developing professional identity in fields such as art therapy where lower wages, fewer jobs,…

This article examines how service-learning provides undergraduate teacher candidates opportunities to cultivate deeper understandings of diversity, social justice, and themselves. Participants were from a mid-Atlantic university and a rural southeastern university. Although from different regions, the teacher candidates shared predominantly White,…

This paper reports on a qualitative and quantitative study in which the service learning projects of college students in special education teacher training were analyzed using elements of quality service learning as criteria. The study used the "portraiture" method of analysis, which attempts to combine empirical and aesthetic description and…

This paper discusses the power that qualitative researchers can hold in how participants perceive, structure, and interpret experiences, particularly through interviews. Examples from a pilot study illustrate how the author influenced participants' views, interpretations, and constructions of the text of the interviews. This paper also presents a…