Service Learning: Learning by Doing and Doing What Matters

Service learning is a means to teach problem solving skills, it assist students in learning more about themselves and their capacities, it fosters collaborative learning and civic responsibility while it enhances relationships between an educational institution and the surrounding community. Definitions abound but the informed movement toward an expansion of service learning on the MSU-Bozeman campus is based on the following ideas: “Students learn and develop through active participation in thoughtfully organized service that is conducted in and meets the needs of the community. It is integrated into and enhances the academic curriculum and includes structured time for the students and participants to reflect on the service experience. ” (Corporation for National Service, 1994, 12) This teaching technique positively influences student learning of course material and has proven to be an effective vehicle for the holistic development of students. “Service learning is a form of experiential education, deeply rooted in cognitive and developmental psychology, pragmatic philosophy, and democratic theory. It shares a common intellectual history with organizational development and participatory action research. Service learning has no singular or simple definition. It is informed by a range of intellectual traditions and values systems, many of which seem to contradict or compete with one another. Service learning theory begins with th