SLS-9d3 - Teachers Then and Now

We need teachers to make service-learning work.  Around 2010, when PolyU started on our service-learning journey, however, we had hardly any teachers who had any experience or training to teach service-learning. To gage our readiness and the challenge that we faced in getting ourselves ready to teach, we conducted a study, interviewing a number of potential teachers.   

Many were worried.  Some wondered about the demand (or rather, the possible lack of it) - are there enough needy people in Hong Kong for our students to serve?  Some worried about the readiness of our students.  PolyU is a strongly technology-oriented university - are students without a humanities or social science background suitable to take service-learning courses?  Some worried whether we have the teachers needed - are teachers without a humanities or social science background suitable to teach service-learning courses?  Reflection is said to be critical - do teachers from sciences and engineering know how to guide students to do reflection?  Some worried about assessment - isn’t assessment of service-learning subjective and unreliable?  

Those were not unreasonable worries, given how little we knew about service-learning at the time.  Fortunately we did not let that stop us. We arrange workshops on various aspects of service-learning, develop e-Learning material to train teachers, embark on piloting to gain experience, develop guidelines for proposal writing, visit well-established programs at leading universities, develop teacher training courses, arrange internship experiences for teachers, organise research salons, organise conferences, publish papers and books, experiment with innovative projects and courses, …  

In ten years time, we have witnessed tremendous growth and development.  Some teachers have expressed gratitude for the opportunity to teach service-learning courses as part of their duty.  Previously they had to find the time outside of work to serve the community in their own way, which is hard given the heavy workload in the university.  Now they can serve the community and train students to do the same, as part of their duty - killing multiple birds with one stone.  

Many questions are answered, not from theory, but hard-earned experience.  Yes, there is no shortage of people to serve - as long as we are willing.  Yes, students in science and engineering can learn serve.  Yes, engineering professors can learn to guide reflection.  Yes, service-learning can be assessed objectively.  Along the way, novices in teaching service-learning become experienced.  A single teacher has assembled a multi-teacher team to teach multiple subjects, send out multiple teams to serve in Hong Kong, Mainland China, Taiwan, Cambodia, and even further afield in the same year.  

A teacher is teaching hundreds of students at a time, assisted by several assistants.  Their teaching team is sending out dozens of student teams to serve multiple primary and secondary schools at the same time.  At the end of each semester of teaching and serving, participating schools send their own students to compete in a territory-wide STEM competition organised by the teacher with hundreds of students having a great time. 

Experienced teachers are offering teacher development workshops, consultation sessions, even full teacher development courses.   To aspiring teachers, not just from  PolyU; not just from Hong Kong, but also Mainland China and foreign countries.  Teachers are engaged in research on service-learning pedagogies, impact of service-learning on their own discipline, and new technologies developed in the context of serving the community.  The results are published in conferences, journals and contribute to consultancies.  Teachers receive prestigious awards for their achievements.  

Even when the coronavirus hit, the teachers are ready.  We are able to switch to teaching online.  It takes a tremendous effort.  But we manage to move much of the service online.  We even create innovative services in the process, opening up some great opportunities.  Now we are taking about and excitedly practicing technology-enhanced and technology-driven service-learning.  Tangible artefacts are integrated into online service.  We are effectively practicing engineering online.  In this sense, the pandemic hit us at the right time, when we are ready.  Had the pandemic hit 10 years earlier, we would not have been able to deal with it in stride. 

Ten years ago, we could not dare imagined that all these would happen as they did.  Service-Learning is not the end that we are aiming at.  It is a pedagogy that is not only effective for teaching, but also for the professional development of us teachers.  The ultimate aim is better education.  Service-Learning is now definitely part of our campus culture.