Service-Learning People

For more than 2 years we could not travel.  In fact, we essentially could not meet people face to face (even in your own institution) because of the pandemic.  In the past year we are catching up, meeting people in a furry, both local and offshore.  One recurring thought among all these experiences is: What a nice bunch of people! 

There are these teachers in the recent Teacher Development Course we held in Cambodia, from Hong Kong, Philippines, Vietnam and India - it is such a joy to teach this class.  There are these people from the United Board of Christian Higher Education in Asia, celebrating 100 years of work, who are very supportive of service-learning.  There are these collaborators from Ateneo University and University of the Philippines Diliman, who are so kindly helping us set up projects in the Philippines, who have such impressive projects of their own.  There are these enthusiastic collaborators from universities and NGOs from Vietnam.  There are, of course, these old friends from Cambodia. We feel like coming home whenever we go to Cambodia.  There is, of course, John and his colleagues from Rwanda.  Professors from so many universities in USA.  Professors from Mainland China.  The list goes on.  

Among the academic communities involved in service-learning, there is evidently a higher percentage of people who care about the students, who are actively engaged with the society, who genuinely care for each other, who see mutual benefits in working together.  In the usual academic communities, such as the crowds we meet at conferences, there is a pervasive sense of competition - to come up with the newest piece of innovative research.  I will guard my secrets until I have published it.  Under these circumstances, genuine collaboration is difficult. 

In the service-learning community, even among academics, there is a lot more admiration for what people are doing, and the desire to learn from each other.  Collaboration in joint projects, as well as research, is much easier seen as mutually beneficial. There is much more of: if I help you in this project, you will help me in the other project.   There is much less of the desire, implicitly as explicitly, to work only with someone who is at least at an equal, if not higher, rank - which is very common in normal academic exchange.  Come to think of it - if everyone follows this principle consistently, there will be very little genuine exchange - unless someone miscalculates.   This applies to individuals, universities, as well as countries.  

There is a real sense of camaraderie.  This is one of the reasons why it is so enjoyable to   work in service-learning.   We are not even talking about students yet.