University campus as service site : addressing campus needs through service-learning

Service-Learning (S-L) has been proven in many studies to be a good means for promoting university students’ civic / community engagement (e.g. Vickers, Harris & McCarthy, 2004; Astin et al., 2006). A vast majority of the services in S-L courses in Higher Education take place in partnering service agencies and communities they serve, such as elderly homes and social enterprises. The idea that university campus is a community with unique needs and therefore a potential service site is often neglected. There are indeed social needs within university campuses, such as food waste (e.g. UC Berkeley, 2012; The City University of Hong Kong, 2012) and food insecurity (e.g. The Florida State University, 2013), which have been identified and addressed by students and faculty, albeit few. At Lingnan University, Hong Kong, the Office of S-L offers an introductory S-L course, titled Community Engagement through Service-Learning. Students are exposed to the basic S-L theories and engage in discussion related to social welfare, a selection of social issues, S-L and critical reflection. They are also required to design, implement and evaluate a S-L project that addresses a specific need on the Lingnan campus. This study aims to explore the impact of different service site arrangements on students’ perceived learning outcomes (with regard to the generic intended outcomes for all S-L courses in the university) and service experience. This will be done qualitatively, by analysing the contents of students’ group project proposals and final reports, as well as that of a mid-term reflective meeting and an end-of-term focus group with the students (N=7). Also, half of the class (4 out of 7) have had S-L experience in other courses, in which they served in external agencies. They will be able to offer comparisons between these two types of service experience (i.e. those on campus and outside campus). The preliminary findings will be available in late May, 2013