Goal:

To actively engage our students in a learning process that is grounded in service, citizenship, and ethical awareness.

Challenge:

Opportunities integration of civic engagement in coursework has often been limited. Service opportunities, for example, may not exist in the local community for a given discipline, may have too much management overhead, and are often limited by the risk of applying undergraduates to problems where the cost of failure was high.

Additionally, in an increasingly global economy, citizenship must be seen in global terms, and by increasing opportunities for communication with diverse views and backgrounds.

Approach:

Use of the web as a tool of engagement. Students can help communities that are distant as well as those that are close, and the nature of web-mediated work is that much of it can be attempted in an environment where the cost of startup is low and the cost of failure very contained.

By incorporating net-enabled projects into our service-learning options, and supporting them, we hope to offer students more opportunities to engage in meaningful civic engagement in their area if study.

Desirable Outcomes:

• We create more opportunities for civic engagement by broadening scope beyond local community as well as seeking out local opportunities for net-enabled solutions.
• Students engage with communities larger and more diverse than our campus can provide.
• We service options to our students where the cost of failure is lower than traditional options.

NOTES:

Further, studies indicate that student reflection is a predictor of openness to new ideas, ability to see issues in a new way, “increased commitment to use of public policy to achieve social justice, and a more systemic locus of problem causes and solutions" (Eyler & Giles). While laudable goals they are not without challenges. In addition, technology can support open student reflection on their experience and how their understanding of civic engagement has changed.

Eyler, J., & Giles, D. E., Jr. (1999). Where's the learning in service-learning? San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

http://www.servicelearning.org/instant_info/fact_sheets/k-12_facts/reflection