Saturday, November 17, 2012

Catching Up in Service-Learning


Service Learning in some form or the other has long been broadly accepted wisdom in universities in many countries such as the USA.  It may appear under different guises or have broader or narrower meanings, such as community service learning, civic engagement, civic responsibility, ...  It may be compulsory or elective.  But many universities recognize its academic value. 

In Hong Kong (and to some extent in China), we are catching up.  More and more service learning subjects and associated service projects are being offered.  More and more students are taking them and discovering how meaningful and enjoyable they can be.  More and more teachers and educators are seeing the real and tangible benefits.

We are still encountering questions such as: It is good for students to do volunteer work, but why should they be given academic credits?  Some students do not want to serve, why should we require/force them to serve?  Some students have poor social skills, why should they be asked to serve? It is very hard to assess their performance and how much they learn, why should we do it?  It is very expensive to teach this way, why should we do it?

Perhaps, not so surprisingly, many skeptics come from the science, engineering, and business disciplines.

The fact is: Through service learning, our students are becoming more mature, more resilient, more responsible as students as well as citizens.  Isn’t it what education is about?  Perhaps it is precisely those students who do not want to do it and those who have poor social skills who need it the most?  Perhaps it is not as difficult as it seems, as many people have been doing it already?  Yes, effective education is expensive; but ignorance, the result of ineffective education, is far more costly.



74 comments:

YTSL said...

Hi Stephen --

I went to college in the US and I hadn't realised until I read your blog that Service Learning was a new thing in Hong Kong.

When I was a student at Beloit College (in Wisconsin), my volunteer activities included tutoring English to a teenage Vietnamese refugee and coaching under-12 boys soccer teams. I also conducted weekly tours of the college voluntarily.

The first two activities made me feel closer to the local community and be able to get to know people that I normally wouldn't have interacted with. The last activity made me feel like I had a greater bond to my college. All of them helped me become more generally confident.

And yes, I agree that those were very much part of my educational experience at Beloit.

StephenC said...

Well, volunteer work is not a new thing in Hong Kong. Community service as extra-curricular activity in a university is also not a new thing. But community service as part of an academic subject with credits which are given grades that affect your GPA - that is new.

Yes, we feel it should be an important part of university education.

YTSL said...

Hi again Stephen --

Aaah, getting credits for it -- okay. Hmmm... but then, is it volunteer work still?

StephenC said...

That's why it is not volunteer work, but (community) service learning. Learning through service to the community. It is related to, but not exactly the same as volunteer work. It is service + learning.

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