This essay welcomes readers to the third in an ongoing series of special sections in the "Michigan Journal of Community Service Learning" devoted to sharing the work of the Service-Learning and Community Engagement Future Directions Project (SLCE-FDP). In this essay, the authors, the five curators of the SLCE-FDP, both introduce the…

From a variation on community service to a discipline-specific strategy to a powerful pedagogy to a vehicle of democracy and the common good, community-based learning has proven itself to be an educational resource whose time has come. In this article, the authors trace the recent history of community-based teaching and learning and its symbiotic…

Advocates for studies designed to promote understanding of how service learning fits with the historical traditions and norms, key concerns and perspectives, and basic assumptions of the various academic disciplines. This agenda can only be successfully addressed by enlisting the active cooperation of national and regional disciplinary and…

An 18-volume series on service-learning in the academic disciplines provides a rudimentary map to a renewed vision of American higher education by opening classroom doors to real-world experiences in workplaces and communities. Discusses: the series background; inclusiveness and disciplinary legitimacy as guiding principles; variations on a theme;…

Suggests that service learning, as an innovative practice in college teaching, challenges faculty in complex ways and proposes a matrix to help conceptualize different focus areas in service learning (student, expertise, sponsor, or common good) and instructional concerns (values development, pedagogical strategies, academic culture, and community…