Background: Service-learning is gaining recognition as a valuable pedagogy for students to gain both academic and psychosocial benefits. This high-impact practice allows students to achieve course learning objectives while contributing to their community's needs. A review from 2007 revealed a lack of research focused on the topic in the prior…

The Supporting Older Adults & Caregivers: Integrative Service Learning (SOCIAL) partnership trains undergraduate social work students to provide practical home-based support for older adults with chronic illness and their family caregivers, serving as a pipeline for future leaders in older adult care. More than 2 million older adults are…

Service learning can prepare undergraduate students with the necessary civic capacities and commitments for today's solutions to wicked social problems. However, most studies on the civic outcomes of service learning, such as civic-mindedness, are student self-reports on surveys given at the end of an academic term. A more nuanced understanding of…

Background/purpose: Cocurricular offerings should appropriately align with academic learning goals to ensure undergraduate students' development of professional dispositions that lead to civic and career success. This study provides a framework for implementing high impact practices into cocurricular instruction, as well as steps on how to align…

National efforts to reform undergraduate education have highlighted the need to relate abstract concepts in biology to real-world examples, especially for non-majors who may undervalue scientific processes. We therefore decided to introduce a module titled "Climate Change, Sustainable Practices and Plastic Pollution," utilizing such…

This study examines the impact of a situated learning class framework on student learning and sense of belonging in a first-year introductory computer programming course offered at an urban commuter campus. The framework provided students opportunities to engage in hands-on activities embedded in authentic contexts facilitated or led by students…

This article discusses the unique situation of teaching an upper-level, undergraduate Spanish conversation course with a service-learning component at a large, public, urban university. With the help of service-learning literature and anonymous pre- and post-surveys, this study aims to offer some qualitative observations and advice on…

Regardless of their particular field of practice, social workers increasingly serve the growing population of older adults in the United States. This article describes the process of integrating an experiential component into a Baccalaureate Social Work (BSW) course involving 75 BSW students. Reflections on the strengths and challenges during 3…

Purpose: To examine the enhancement of a university health course through the utilization of the CIPP Model as a means to develop an integrated service-learning component. Methods: The CIPP model was utilized in two concurrent semesters of an undergraduate health course in order to design and evaluate the implementation of a drug and alcohol…

This article documents and analyses the uneasy, if not contradictory, relationship between service learning and liberal arts thinking in an undergraduate programme in Global Development Studies (GDS) at a North American University. As an undergraduate, Cororaton participated in a service-learning project to build a greenhouse in Mongolia; at the…

Learning is enhanced with repetition, either through more exercises in individual courses, or through the integration of concepts in a capstone experience. A well planned and integrated curriculum can utilize a capstone course, not only to provide a service learning component, but also as an opportunity to refresh students on key discipline topics…

The 2008 presidential election catapulted "community organizers" into the media fray and raised awareness about community organizing. At the University of San Diego (USD), a course teaching consensus organizing techniques to address community issues was instituted in 2004. The course incorporates traditional undergraduate students and…

This paper presents a brief overview of the changes made during our department level reform (DLR) process (Grant Title: "A Systems Approach for Civil and Environmental Engineering Education: Integrating Systems Thinking, Inquiry-Based Learning and Catamount Community Service-Learning Projects") and some of the effects of these changes on…

The National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE) documents dimensions of quality in undergraduate education and provides information and assistance to colleges, universities, and other organizations to improve student learning. Its primary activity is annually surveying college students to assess the extent to which they engage in educational…