International Service-learning Course Research Articles

Educational Benefits of an International Service-Learning Course in Honduras for Doctor of Physical Therapy Students

International service-learning (ISL) activities are academic experiences that encompass participation in organized service activities, practical experiences, and critical reflection. The assessment of physical therapy clinical education is primarily achieved through student performance on the clinical performance instrument (CPI) during clinical education. The CPI assesses a student’s performance in all subdomains of professional practice and patient management and is completed during each clinical education experience

The Development of Student's Understanding of Self, Inequality, and Service during a Critical International Service Learning Program in the Dominican Republict

Since January 2018, my colleague and I have co-led a two-week, three-credit critical international service learning course to Santiago de Los Caballeros, Dominican Republic. Our course is designed to question and complicate students’ relationship to service through the use of intergroup dialogue pedagogy and theory. Intergroup dialogue (IGD) encourages students to understand one another across their social identities (e.g., race, gender, sexuality, ability, nationality, ability, etc.) by engaging in conversations around social issues and power that allow us to unpack our relationship to systems of oppression and inequality (Zúñiga 2003). My proposed research is focused on the 2020 iteration of this program and will look more closely at the impact on student learning to see how, if it all, students' ideas around identity, the nature of inequality, and the purpose of service shift throughout their experience abroad. Through analysis of student reflection journals and multiple interviews with participants, I hope to gain insight into this question. This research will add to the growing field of critical studies of international service learning by assessing whether or not our program and its pedagogy is able to undo oppressive ideologies and/or strengthen existing ideologies built on collective solidarity that our students carry regarding identity, inequality and service.

Assessing student expectations and perceptions of a short-term international service-learning experience.

Despite nursing students' need for cultural education, few studies have measured what students expect from international service-learning experiences and how their perceptions of the actual experience compare to these expectations. To increase understanding of global nursing experiences, the purpose of this study was to examine the similarities and differences between nursing students' anticipated (pre-travel) personal and professional developmental expectations and reported (posttravel) personal and developmental outcomes. This study employed a mixed descriptive research design. Quantitative data was secured through survey methodology. Written responses to open-ended questions provided qualitative data for analysis. Between 2012 and 2017, 43 undergraduate and graduate nursing students at a Midwestern university completed surveys and narratives about their participation in an international service-learning course in Kenya. Students' anticipated learning was achieved through their international experiences. Participants also experienced personal growth, professional development, cultural competency enhancement, and transformation from the educational experience. They also described how their experiences would change their personal and professional lives. The depth and breadth of the growth and learning described by students is consistent with the expectations of high-impact educational practices.

Transforming students into global citizens: International service learning and PRME

How can we encourage business students to become global citizens and responsible leaders as is advocated in the PRME Initiative? In this paper, we argue that one pedagogical approach is to give them an opportunity to collaborate with people from a variety of disciplines and backgrounds in a developing country through a faculty-led international service learning (ISL) course. The example ISL program summarized here provides students an opportunity to collaborate with others in developing countries as partners in applying both their own area of disciplinary study (e.g. business, health care, education) and other areas as well. Results show that faculty learn more about how to make the PRME principles more actionable as students view their role as global citizens much more deeply, broadly and personally after taking our international service learning course.

Student Outcomes From Participating in an International STEM Service-Learning Course

The purpose of this study was to measure student affective, behavior, and content (ABC) and global awareness outcomes after participating in a science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM)–based international service-learning (ISL) course and impacts on long-term retention in STEM fields. We compared experiences from 12 participants (undergraduate and graduate students) enrolled in a STEM-based ISL course with experiences from four students enrolled in the same course without the service-learning component. The ISL course involved classroom discussions on environmental topics and four local and ISL projects with community partners to contribute to conservation efforts. Data came from student responses on a civics awareness questionnaire, reflective journal entries, and responses captured during individual semistructured interviews 2 years after the course. Findings indicate positive improvements in affective outcomes, significant gains in civic awareness, differences in behaviors based on class of student, specific content gains related to service-learning activities, global awareness gains for all students, and differential impacts on retention in STEM-related fields.

Assessing the Merits of International Service-learning in Developing Professionalism in Mass Communication

This project assessed how an international service-learning course affected mass communication students' knowledge of professionalism. Using written reflections and focus group transcripts from four courses that took place in Central America, we observed that placing students in immersive environments, where they are able to work on authentic tasks, can enhance their knowledge of specific professional issues. Our observations include managing client relationships, negotiating diverse project teams, and making technology choices appropriate to client and audience. We isolate significant aspects of the course pedagogy and offer suggestions to adapt conventional semester projects to gain some of the affordances of immersion and authenticity.

Metaphorically Speaking: Semiotic Analysis of Images Gathered from an International Service Learning Course

Metaphorically Speaking: Semiotic Analysis of Images Gathered from an International Service Learning Course

Pura Vida with a Purpose: Energizing Engagement with Human Rights through Service-Learning

This paper examines the effects of an international service-learning course with a strong human rights component. Human rights have social justice as an essential component and advancing both are considered core competencies in social work. International education in colleges and universities has gained in popularity as has service-learning. Research has been carried out in both these areas. However, less research has been done on the combination of the two. In this paper a course is described during which students spent three weeks in Costa Rica, the land of Pura Vida, learning about its human rights efforts, its language, getting to know its people, and providing service to some of its citizens. An analysis of student surveys and journals revealed a strengthened belief on the part of the participants that they are competent to have an impact on the world as well as having a responsibility to do so.

Editor's Note

Editor's Note

Service-Learning and Faith Formation

Although "spiritual growth" is occasionally cited as an outcome of participation in servicelearning events and classes, little research has focused on this particular area. This article describes a qualitative research project that investigated undergraduate students' perceptions of the impact of a short-term international service-learning course on their spiritual lives and faith formation. Applying the insights of Sharon Parks and James Fowler as theorists in the field of faith formation and Janet Eyler and Dwight Giles in the area of service-learning pedagogy, journals, academic papers, and interviews from 38 students were analyzed using a computerassisted qualitative data analysis software program (NVivo). The article includes both psychosocial and biblical-theological interpretation of the data. Faith is defined as the matrix of meaning that human beings construct, negotiate, disassemble, and reconstruct throughout their lives as they seek to make sense of the world, their lives, their relationships with others, and God.

Partnering with a sister city organization for an international service-learning experience.

A partnership was established between Indiana University School of Nursing in Indianapolis and the Bloomington, Indiana-Posoltega, Nicaragua Sister City International organization to provide an international service-learning course in nursing. The course evolved over 4 years from an independent study for a single student to an elective course taken by 10 students. Student-learning activities included the following: developing relationships with community residents, providing prenatal classes, supporting nursing scholarships, and participating as interdisciplinary, multicultural team members. Partnering with our local Sister City International organization provided a rich opportunity for nursing students to learn about and participate with Nicaraguan and international health care workers in meeting population health needs in stable and refugee environments.