Document Type
Presentation
Journal/Book Title/Conference
Sixth Annual Utah Valley State College Conference by the Faculty
Publisher
Utah Valley State College
Publication Date
9-2004
First Page
1
Last Page
9
Abstract
Academic service-learning is a relatively new pedagogy that is now being used in college and university courses across the country. In a 1995 speech by D. M. Shafer, it was cited as a "means of responding to concerns about the loss of a sense of community and concurrent citizenship behaviors in the country" (Easterling & Rudell, 1997, p. 59). Although some would purport that the trend toward decreased civic engagement among the teens and young adults of today is unique, Dewey (1938) had these similar concerns nearly seven decades ago. He explained:
The society is a number of people held together because they are working along common lines, in a common spirit, and with reference to common aims. The common needs and aims demand a growing interchange of thought and growing unity of sympathetic feeling. The radical reason that the present school cannot organize itself as a natural social unit is because just this element of common and productive activity is absent. Upon the play-ground, in game and sport, social organization takes place spontaneously and inevitably. There is something to do, some activity to be carried on, requiring natural divisions of labor, selection of leaders and followers, mutual cooperation and emulation. In the schoolroom the motive and the cement of social organization are alike wanting. Upon the ethical side, the tragic weakness of the present school is that it endeavors to prepare future members of the social order in a medium in which the conditions of the social spirit are eminently wanting. (p. 11-12)
In short, Dewey taught that students should be active participants. engaged in the learning process. He felt that students should learn through experience and that these well-designed engaging activities could link a student with opportunities for community involvement and civic engagement. Academic service-learning appears to be a teaching methodology that does just this.
Recommended Citation
Madsen, Susan R., "Engaging in Excellence Through Academic Service-Learning: A Way to Teach and Learn Citizenship and Justice in Any College Course" (2004). Marketing and Strategy Faculty Publications. Paper 357.
https://digitalcommons.usu.edu/marketing_facpub/357