Assessing Service-Learning: Results from a Survey of "Learn and Serve America, Higher Education"

• Published in: Change (New Rochelle, N.Y.) Vol. 32; no. 2; pp. 30 - 39
• Main Authors: Gray, Maryann J., Ondaatje, Elizabeth Heneghan, Fricker, Ronald D., Geschwind, Sandy A.
• Format: Magazine Article
• Language: English
• Published: Philadelphia Heldref Publications 01.03.2000; Taylor & Francis Inc
• Subjects: College campuses; College presidents; College students; Colleges; Colleges & universities; Community organizing; Community service; Core curriculum; Course Content; Curricula; Educational Improvement; Higher education; Leadership; Learning; Learning Processes; Life skills; Outcomes of education; Service learning; Student Development; Student participation; Student surveys; Teachers; Thinking Skills; Universities; Volunteer labor; Volunteerism; Volunteers
• ISSN: 0009-1383; 1939-9146

According to Dwight Giles, Ellen Porter Honnet, and Sally Migliore in their 1991 report, Research Agenda for Combining Service and Learning in the 1990s (National Society for Experiential Education), One of the characteristics of service-learning that distinguishes it from volunteerism is its balance between the act of community service by participants and reflection on that act, in order both to provide better service and to enhance the participants' own learning... Since grants were awarded competitively, it is also likely that the Learn and Serve schools, on average, had relatively strong service-learning programs. [...]our findings provide a profile of service-learning within those institutions that are among the most committed and involved. Results indicated no difference in expected or received course grades between the two groups. [...]we found no evidence that satisfaction was the result of especially lenient grading practices in service-learning courses. More research is needed to determine if the differences between RAND's findings and those of other researchers are attributable to methodological factors such as sample size, measures, or statistical analyses; to course-based factors such as the nature of the service-learning courses and programs studied; or to characteristics of students participating in the research. [...]a stronger body of research exists, caution is called for in making claims about the effects of service-learning on student development and learning.