Police trainings at museums have been a small but strong program within the museum field. Programs that provide youth and police the opportunity to engage one another in structured learning environments can enable those participants to share personal experiences, explore negative stereotypes, and discuss mutual perceptions of controversial topics…

This chapter explores elements that should be included in a service learning style internship program in urban community colleges. It provides theoretical background and descriptions of best practices for forming community partnerships, collaboratively developing learning outcomes, and aligning program design with institutional general education…

There is strong evidence that all students can gain significant learning benefit when their courses include opportunities for engagement with real-world problems, beyond the walls of their higher education institution (HEI). Internationally, cross-disciplinary discussions are increasing around the value of student learning that involves community…

This article describes an innovative project that combined service learning and community-based partnerships to teach macro practice skills to social work students and citizenship skills to primary school students. The partners, a small social work program, several primary schools, and an internationally recognized civic engagement program,…

This article features Project 540, a national civic education program directly engaging high-schoolers in the democratic process. Project 540 is a dynamic and moving initiative that brings students full-circle to produce civic action plans based on what their school and community have to offer. The author emphasizes that civic participation based…

Uses a critical postmodern analysis to examine the range of thinking and contemporary practice in the field of service learning. Introduces a new schema, discourse-praxis community, as a way to conceptualize the field and to reexamine issues such as diversity, historicity, conflict, and power. (SM)

Presents materials for an instructional activity where students contact and interview members of the local legal community concerning issues of civil law. Includes a series of question and situations that students can use to elicit responses. The questions concern constitutional rights of students, tort law, and family law. (MJP)

Presents 10 ideas for service learning projects designed for elementary schools. Includes having students do local history projects complete with interviews and artifacts, learn about community volunteering, interact with the elderly, care for the environment, recycle materials, and hold canned food drives. (MJP)

The content, skills, pedagogy, and structure that should guide the design of service learning curricula for citizenship education are examined. For service learning to teach youth about their responsibilities as citizens in a democratic society, content and strategies must model and support democratic principles. (SM)

This booklet provides information for creating an oral history project as part of a service learning program in schools. It shares a user-friendly approach to oral histories using one practitioner's experience during several years of classroom practice and a year as a Christa McAuliffe Fellow. The following topics are discussed: (1) the richness…

Service learning can help students learn specific skills and concepts, particularly in social studies. The article examines characteristics of good middle school service learning projects, explains how to begin a project, discusses the benefits of service learning, presents an example of service learning in Wren Middle School, Piedmont (South…

During the 1988-89 school year, a Bicentennial Model Site Program was conducted by the American Bar Association's Special Committee on Youth Education for Citizenship. This program was designed to improve students' understanding of the U.S. Constitution and the Bill of Rights by forging partnerships between schools and communities at the local…

Provides 11 guideposts for teachers and students planning constructive community action projects. These include avoid overanalysis at the beginning, write your original idea down before you modify it, ignore negativity, do your homework, build a core group, and recruit community allies. (MJP)

Details a series of service learning projects conducted by a California middle school social studies class. Creative, inexpensive, and substantive, the projects included writing to Manuel Noreiga in prison, creating a feed-the-homeless garden, and translating city documents into other languages. (MJP)

This guidebook is designed to provide teachers, schools, parents, and other community leaders with the needed ideas, strategies, and resources to combine service learning and character education in meaningful educational activities for children and young people. The booklet contains seven short sections that provide an overview of character…