Service learning has its roots in two different types of programs: community service activities, which were traditionally considered part of the extracurricular realm, and experiential education, usually available as practicums or internships. The American Association of Community Colleges (AACC) defines service learning as an instructional methodology that integrates community service with academic instruction as it focuses on critical, reflective thinking and civic responsibility. The Campus Compact National Center for Community Colleges expands that definition to include the following purposes of service learning:
- to assist students in acquiring and enhancing academic knowledge, civic skills, career aspirations, and an ethic of service;
- to help faculty move from teaching-centered to learning-centered to community-centered pedagogy;
- to assist colleges in becoming major contributors to community improvement; and
- to help communities become safer places to live (Pickeral & Peters, 1997).
The benefits attributed to participation in service learning are extensive. They include enhanced learning, values clarification, increased sense of community and citizenship responsibilities, greater multicultural awareness, increased faculty involvement, improved critical thinking and problem-solving skills, improved self-esteem and competence, empathy for others, an opportunity for career exploration, and work skills development.
The distinction between experiential education and service learning is unclear. AACC claims that service learning is related to but does not include cooperative education, practicum, or internship programs, but some consider service learning to be a type of experiential learning. Experiential learning is the process whereby knowledge is created through the transformation of experience. He describes learning as a four-stage cycle of concrete experience, reflective observation, abstract conceptualization, and active experimentation.
This process serves as an ideal model for service learning, and the step of reflective observation helps to distinguish service learning from other experiential education. "Traditionally, students in these [experiential education] programs reflect primarily on their personal and professional development...............
