Service Learning

Service learning, a form of experiential education, has its roots in the ideas and writings of educational philosopher John Dewey. Dewey declared that the aim of community effectiveness calls attention to the fact that authority must be relative to doing something worthwhile, and to the reality that the things most in need of being done are things that entail one's connection with others. Furthermore, social efficiency includes that which makes a person's experience more meaningful to others, as well as that which enables one to contribute more completely in the experiences of contemporaries. As a result of Dewey's work and that of the National Society for Experiential Education (NSEE), many forms of experiential learning can be found in Grades K–16 in public as well as in private education. Some examples include: tutoring, mentoring, cooperative learning, collaborative learning, internships, public service, and youth service.

Service learning as a term first appears in the late 1960s in the publications of the Southern Regional Education Board whose primary writers were Robert Sigmon and William Ramsay. In 1969, the Office of Economic Opportunity established the National Student Volunteer Program, which later became the National Center for Service Learning. In 1971, this program and two others—Peace Corps and VISTA—combined to form the federal agency ACTION.

Service learning was introduced to and present on many college campuses during the late 1960s and the 1970s. From the mid-1980s, service learning on [Page 814]campuses increased in popularity. In 1985 the Education Commission of the States began Campus Compact or the Project for Public and Community Service. Today, this is a national coalition of more than 1,100 college and university presidents—traditionally involving more than 20 million students—devoted to promoting community service, civic engagement, and service learning in university education.

As a result of community service and the spread of service-learning programs, the NSEE began to establish a set of principles of good practice in 1987. This effort culminated in a 1989 Wingspread conference hosted by the Johnson Foundation at which the Principles of Good Practice in Combining Service and Learning were articulated. Wingspread offered the ideal that any definition of service learning must represent service combined with learning, which adds value to each and transforms both.

After this conference Kendall and Associates published the classic three-volume set, Combining Service and Learning, under the auspices of the NSEE and in collaboration with 91 national and regional associations. The document contains a wide range of resources on service learning in K–12 and higher education plus an annotated bibliography on service-learning literature.

NSEE hosted another Wingspread conference in 1991. As a result of the push for research on the benefits and effects of service learning, the Michigan Journal of Community Service Learning was launched in late 1994.

In recognition of the need for a widely agreed-on definition of service learning and a set of standards by which to judge programs, a diverse group of service-learning educators formed the Alliance for Service Learning in Education Reform, or ASLER. They defined service learning in 1993 as a system by which young people discover and extend through active involvement in thoughtfully organized service experiences

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