No Impact, No Service, No Learning

Service-Learning is the balanced integration of service and learning.  Students learn to serve the community. At the same time, they learn through serving the community.  Hence the service is the key.  If no service is rendered, it cannot be considered service-learning; and there will not be learning through Service-Learning.  That should be clear. 

Assuming that the students have carried out some project, how does one know whether the project is actually serving the community? One can ask a number of questions. First of all, what social need is it addressing?  Secondly, who is the intended beneficiary?  Thirdly, is it really beneficial for the beneficiary?  Or one can summarise them in one question: is the project making a tangible impact?  

Take the case of a project installing a solar panel to power lighting for a family  previously without electricity.  There is an obvious need - the lack of electricity.  The beneficiary is clearly identified - the family has names and faces, in flesh and blood.  The benefit is also easy to see - even after sunset, the mother can cook and wash, thc children can study, the family can visit their friends, they can listen to their radio, the children do better at school, the family is more productive, they have a better future.  The students receive immediate feedback, from the family themselves.  In this type of projects, stakes are high, and failure is possible.  If one tries to install a set of solar panels but no electricity is generated, the impact can be quite negative.  

Teaching-based projects can be tricky to evaluate.  The team may be teaching science, English, mathematics, artificial intelligence, public health, etc.  How does one determine whether the class has actually learned what was intended?  Theoretically that can be assessed through tests, examination, projects, etc.  Most of the time, however, these are conducted as extra-curricular activities without formal assessments.  It may also not be easy to determine whether the teaching is done well.  In some cases, such as robotics or some engineering projects, the class will build something as a deliverable, which can be a reasonably clear demonstration of learning.  Herein may lie the impact.  

How about studying the impact of cigarette smoking, writing a report on the study, and putting together an exhibition on campus, as an anti-smoking advocacy?  There is a social issue.  There is a target group of recipients - the fellow students in the school.  Is there real benefits for the fellow students?  How does one know whether anyone is better informed?  Whether anyone change their behaviour?  Or even pay any attention to the posters put up on campus?  Projects that aim to educate or benefit the “public” may be difficult to evaluate for impact.  How does not know who has been reached? Who has benefited?  By how much?  

Nowadays it is quite popular for projects to produce videos or other forms of material to advocate certain worthy cause, such as environmental conservation, anti-drug use, etc., to be put on social media, such as YouTube.  However, with such a bewildering glut of viewing and listening material on social networks these days, it is a huge challenge to attract any attention at all. Marketing such material require ingenuity, effort, and perhaps professional skills.  If effort is spent in producing the material, but nobody sees them, there cannot be any meaningful impact on the intended audience.  It would appear that there is no meaningful service.  There is no benefit for, and no feedback from the intended community.  Surely the teacher or some expert can be asked to judge the quality of the material produced.  But this becomes an academic exercise.  Not service-learning.  

If there is no impact, there is no service.  The students may still have learning something.  But if there is no service, it is not service-learning.