Engagement

Adequately preparing students can help create a more successful service learning experience for everyone involved. 

Service Orientation
We recommend allocating some class time for a service orientation, so students feel prepared to enter community projects. Helpful orientation topics include:

• An introduction to service learning
• Explaining how service learning connects to course objectives
• Practices that lead to good and ethical service
• The roles and responsibilities of each party
• Communicating with community partners
• Confronting power and privilege in service
• The importance of personal and critical reflection
• Concluding a service project

We CU Community Engaged Scholars, in collaboration with the Illinois Leadership Center, developed an interactive, in-personal orientation for students enrolled in service learning classes. Please contact the Illinois Leadership Center to request a workshop. We also offer PowerPoint slides for instructors who wish to conduct their own orientations.

Assigning Projects
Instructors should coordinate student project assignments if their course has multiple service projects. Some instructors assign students to community projects based on students' skill, expertise, and interest. Other instructors allow students to choose projects that interest them most. There are many platforms available online to help make this process easier. The Office of Public Engagement encourages the use of Illini GivePulse, which can coordinate project sign-ups and help you track student service hours. Sign-up Genius and Google forms are other free and easy options for coordinating project sign-ups.

Introducing Students and Community Partners 
It’s a good idea to formalize introductions, so students see community partners as co-educators and collaborators who are available to support them throughout the semester.  Many faculty invite community partners to class to introduce themselves, provide an overview of their organization, discuss project logistics and expectations, outline roles and responsibilities, and answer students' questions. This is also a chance to review communication expectations and procedures.

Resources

• Student orientation sample power point slides
• Illini GivePulse
• Michigan State University “Contacting Your Community Partner” student guide

Reflection is an essential element of service learning and helps distinguish community engaged learning from volunteering.

Why reflection?
Reflection helps students connect their service experience to course outcomes, develop critical thinking and communication skills, and find meaning in their service experience. Without critical reflection, service learning can unwittingly reinforce students' stereotypes and assumptions about the communities they are engaging.

Instructors should integrate opportunities for reflection throughout the semester and consider offering multiple avenues for student participation, including written, visual, and verbal prompts. Journaling, blogging, in-class discussions, presentations, storyboarding, and video responses are all effective reflection strategies.

Personal Reflection
Personal reflection offers service learning students a chance to make examine their expectations, values, and fears, so they feel prepared to enter a community partnership. Here are some prompts that encourage students to revisit themselves in preparation for their project:

• Revisit yourself:
  • What does community mean to you?
  • What does service mean to you, and why do you want to engage in service?
  • What values inform your understanding of community service?
  • What are some community assets? What are some injustices, inequities, or community needs?
  • What fears do you have about partnering with a community organization?

• Get to know your organization:
  • What is the organization's mission? When was it created and why?
  • Who does your organization serve?
  • What are some of the major accomplishments of the organization?
  • Why is service needed?

• Set goals for your service:
  • What expectations do you have about your service placement?
  • What do you hope to learn from community engagement?
  • What strengths or skills do you bring that may be useful?
  • How will your project be meaningful to your own personal and professional growth?
  • How will you link what you learn in the community to what you learn in the classroom?
  • How can you continue supporting the community outside of service work?

Critical Reflection
Critical reflection can transform students' service learning experiences into profoundly meaningful experiences. The popular "What? So What? Now What?" framework guides students toward deeper learning.

• What? These "notice" questions start the reflection process by helping students focus on what they observed and felt during their service experience.
  • What drew you to this organization or service project?
  • What are the long-term goals of the service project?
  • What is your role in this service project?
  • What have you accomplished during your service experience?
  • What skills and knowledge did you bring to the service project?
  • What surprised or challenged you?

• So what? These "meaning" questions invite participants to reflect on significance of their service experience.
  • What did this project make you think about?
  • What did your service experience teach you about structural barriers or root causes of need?
  • How is your community engagement connected to your classroom learning?
  • How is your community engagement connected to your personal and professional goals?
  • What were the most difficult or satisfying parts of your service experience? Why?
  • How has your service experience changed your outlook and opinions?
  • What questions are still unanswered?

• Now what? These "action" questions encourage students to apply their service experience toward future actions.
  • How has your understanding of the community changed because of your service?
  • How has your understanding of the university changed because of your service?
  • How can you educate others or raise awareness about our community's assets and needs?
  • What lessons from this experience will you take with you in your life? In your studies? In your career?
  • What would you do differently next time?

Resources

• We CU Student Reflection Guide
• DEAL (Describe-Examine-Articulate Learning) Model for Critical Reflection
• Privilege Walk
• Project READY: Reimagining Equity & Access for Diverse Youth

Assessment helps you understand and measure students' experiences and understanding of course concepts, so you can refine your teaching methods and learning objectives. Below, we introduce some key concepts and resources that can help you assess students' learning.

Assessing Student learning 
Assessment should focus on how students are connecting service to course objectives rather than the service activity itself. Student learning and hours served don't always correlate, so assignments need to provide evidence of how students' service experiences are impacting their attitudes, values, and skills.

Formative assessments might include in-class reflections, peer evaluations, group discussions, observations, and one-on-one meetings. Summative assessments might include journal entries, written assignments, presentations, creative projects, or portfolios. No matter which types of assessment you use, you should:

• Align assessments with learning objectives. Well-designed assessments should give an indication of the standards of students' expected performance associated with each learning objective.
  
  
• Use a rubric and share it with students. Rubrics are an easy way to communicate expectations and provide a clear path for measuring student achievement.
  
  
• Offer clear instructions and feedback. Students must be able to understand both your instructions and feedback, and both should align with the course learning objective being assessed.
  
  

Community Partners' Role
As co-educators, community partners and faculty enter partnerships with the intention of contributing equally to students’ learning. Therefore, faculty should invite community partners to help determine student success measures and what types of assessment are most appropriate. Faculty might also ask community partners to fill out brief student evaluation forms.

Resources

• CITL Guide on Assessing Student Learning
• Association of American Colleges and Universities Civic Engagement Rubric
• Campus Compact Assessment of Students' Civic Learning and Development Knowledge Hub
• The Service-Learning Quality Assessment Tool (SLQAT)
• Purdue University Service Learning Assessment Toolkit 

• Sarah L. Ash, Patti H. Clayton, and Maxine P. Atkinson, “Integrating Reflection and Assessment to Capture and Improve Student Learning, Michigan Journal of Community Service Learning, vol. 11, no. 2 (2005): 49-60.
• Sarah L. Ash and Patti H. Clayton, “Generating, Deepening, and Documenting Learning: The Power of Critical Reflection for Applied Learning,” Journal of Applied Learning in Higher Education, vol. 1, no. 1 (2009): 25-48.
• Robert E. Bleicher and Manuel G. Correia, “Using a ‘Small Moments’ Writing Strategy to Help Undergraduate Students Reflect on Their Service-Learning Experiences,” Journal of Higher Education Outreach and Engagement, vol. 15, no. 4 (2011): 27-56.
• Lori E. Kniffin, Patti H. Clayton, Jasmina Camo-Biogradlija, Mary F. Price, Robert G. Bringle, and Haden M. Botkin “Deepening Community-Campus Relationships Using a Critical Reflection Tool: A Multisite, Mixed-Methods Study,” International Journal of Research on Service-Learning and Community Engagement, vol. 11, no. 1 (2023): 1-18.
• Kristin E. Norris, “Critical Reflection and Civic Mindedness Expanding Conceptualizations and Practices,” in The Cambridge Handbook of Service Learning and Community Engagement, 2017.
• Laura Selmo “The Narrative Approach in Service-Learning Methodology: A Case Study,” International Journal of Research on Service-Learning and Community Engagement, vol. 3, no. 1 (Fall 2015).