Service-Learning in Nonprofit Organizations: Motivations, Expectations, and Outcomes.

Abstract

Service-learning, a form of experiential learning in which classroom instruction is reinforced by community service (Hunter & Brisbin, 2000), is now a common and well accepted curricular component at many universities (Eyler & Giles, 1999).The service-learning literature has clearly demonstrated the benefits to students in two areas: their education is enhanced and they are more likely to be engaged citizens throughout adulthood.The benefits accruing to students from service-learning include improving critical thinking skills, integrating theory and practice, improving communication skills, and creating sustained civic engagement (Battistoni, 1997;Gray, Ondaatje, Fricker, & Geschwind, 2000;Hunter & Brisbin, 2000; Jacoby, 1996).Although service-learning literature is replete with information on the learning benefits that accrue to service-learning students (e.g., Astin & Sax, 1998; Eyler & Giles, 1999;Kenny, 2002), it is relatively bereft of information on the actual, rather than implied, service benefits to the community (Eyler, Giles, & Gray, 1999; Ward & Wolf-Wendel, 1997).The overall impression given by the servicelearning literature is that the value of service to the community is more or less assumed.As long as the program is well-designed, the value of the service is somehow assured.The definitions of the "service" that occurs in service-learning relate most often to the creation of improved citizens, thus accruing benefits both to the students and society (Kenny).Research demonstrates that those who contribute to society as college students will build social capital-they make more informed voters, better parents, and more likely volunteers as adults (Eyler & Giles, 1999).As important as these bene-fits are, they are still focused on students as the service recipients, rather then the community partner organizations.Eyler and Giles' Where's the Learning in Service-Learning?(1999) led us to wonder, quixotically, Where's the service in service-learning?More to the point, to whom is the service being provided?Admittedly, more attention has been paid in recent years to the community partner's perspective.Ferrari and Worrall (2000) offer a program evaluation from the perspective of staff at urban-based community partners, assessing student performance using qualitative and quantitative items.The organization's perception of students, faculty, and community impacts of the service-learning experience are also highlighted in other recent studies (Schmidt & Robby, 2002;Vernon & Ward, 1999).While these studies help shed light on the community partner perspective, more research is needed.Our personal experiences call into question the assumed direction and value of the service in service-learning, and suggest that the service component is complex.Studies assessing the impact of service-learning must go further to understand the reciprocal nature of the "service" in service-learning.It was not too long ago, that we, now assistant professors, were staff members of nonprofit organizations and fielding proposals from professors and students to establish some sort of experiential/service-learning arrangement.Remarkably, we both had similar experiences and reactions to those overtures: to balance the time required to train and supervise the student-which was certain-against the likelihood that the service provided by the student would actually be useful-which was, in our Service-Learning in Nonprofit Organizations: Motivations, Expectations, and Outcomes

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