Community-based research has been suggested as a particularly effective form of service learning in college-community collaborations. This paper reviews findings from interviews with alumni/ae and community partners of an environmental and economic sustainability center at Allegheny College in Northwest Pennsylvania, the Center for Economic and…

Service-learning is an educational practice that has been used successfully in many disciplines, and is defined as "a credit-bearing, educational experience in which students participate in an organized service activity that meets identified community needs and reflect on the service activity in such a way as to gain further understanding of…

This study examines the effects of the Community Action service learning project, part of the Learn and Serve America program, on gifted adolescents and their community. Using a case study design, the author investigates this service learning project grounded in creative problem solving. The importance of service learning to the participants is…

Three professors engaged in writing centers, educational technology, and service learning at Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi collaborated with two technical writing teachers in a rural high school to establish a multimedia writing center and study its impact. This article presents the outcomes of this collaboration. It was found that the…

Service learning aims to promote academic learning and meet community needs. When students interview elderly residents in a nursing home about their experiences during World War II, they gain eyewitness historical information and provide company to persons who otherwise may have few visitors. Such situations are designed to be "win-win." Students…

Despite many service-learning programs that are now in practice, the empirical assessment of their effectiveness is sparse, due in part, to the difficulty in identifying a common indicator to measure effectiveness. In order to bolster the empirical assessment of these programs, evaluation of one such service-learning program is presented here.…

It is common practice for universities across the globe to engage in some form of benevolent interaction with communities beyond the borders of their campuses. Current legislative transformation in higher education in South Africa, for example, urges higher education institutions to become more responsive to civil society through projects that are…

This research brief discusses how to integrate service learning into institutional culture, climate, and expectations so that it can be sustained. According to studies in the 1990s, the use of service learning in community colleges increased almost 50% in just a few years. While the number of these programs has grown significantly, not all are…

This article offers a preliminary report of the first 2 years of a 3-year partnership between a university faculty member and a public middle-school teacher. The partnership was guided by four questions: How does academic service learning transform curricular delivery and the critical identity of teacher as a professional? What is the impact of…

A study investigated effects of a comprehensive 2-year service-learning program on 25 college students' level of modern (symbolic) racism. A nonequivalent control group experiment was conducted at a large state university in the West. Results support the hypothesis that students involved in service-learning show larger reductions in modern racism…

Twelve social work students in southern Illinois completed their field placement in a rural community-based agency. Analysis of students' reflective logs demonstrates their progressive development in the areas of rapport building with clients, understanding organizational aspects of the agency, awareness of community issues and resources, and…

A study investigated the effects of service-learning projects conducted by 255 student teachers and designed in cooperation with their cooperating teachers. Drawing on survey and case-study data, it was found that classroom-based service-learning projects, if structured carefully, can contribute to student-teacher empowerment and enhanced…

A study examining the contributions of service learning to students' cognitive, affective, civic, and social development surveyed 801 ninth-grade students in 6 school districts over 2 years. Personal development and civic involvement ratings were significantly higher for students who engaged in all three types of service activity: volunteerism,…

The development of civic responsibility is considered to be an important component of healthy adolescent development. However, the study of its development has been relatively neglected and few studies have attempted to ground understanding of its development in a theoretical framework. The present study operationalized civic responsibility as…

This article uses primary and secondary research on educational, social, and political theory in the late 19th and early 20th centuries to argue that the history of service-learning must be revised to include Jane Addams' pioneering work. A full consideration of Addams significantly revises understanding the origins of service-learning, suggesting…