Examples of Interdisciplinary Introductory to Service-Learning Courses

Posted by HE-SL Listserv on September 12, 2023

A recent post on the Higher Education Service-Learning listserv (HE-SL) posed the following question: Do any of you have an example of an interdisciplinary 1-3 credit introductory to service-learning course (Potentially with multiple instructors each bringing perspective and examples from their own discipline)? Syllabus?

Here are the responses:

• The National Youth Leadership Council (NYLC) has designed a 64 hour certificate course that integrates service learning and instructional leadership.  The syllabus is available here.
• The University of Michigan’s Collaborating for Change MOOC isn’t a credit-bearing course, but is an introduction to community engagement, power&privilege, and social change. Some people take it straight through, while others use a module or parts of a module within a course that includes community engagement.
• I teach Intro to Service Learning and Advanced Service Learning for University College at Arkansas State University. The Intro class focuses mainly on the curriculum from the book Leadership for a Better World, Understanding the Social Change Model of Leadership Development by Susan R. Komives and Wendy Wagner. The students also execute a small service project during the Intro class. For example, this semester they have chosen to do a Humane Society fundraiser/adoption day on our campus with a pet Halloween costume contest as the gimmick to get folks to participate. Other assignments include applying knowledge learned from the curriculum to movies or documentaries we watch in class. In the Advanced class, they plan and execute a large-scale project, so the final for the Intro class is pitching an idea for an Advanced class project. This also requires the Intro students to research what other universities are doing for service projects. View the syllabus here.
• Portland State requires an interdisciplinary general education community-engaged Capstone for graduation. You can view over 100 of our Capstone courses here. (If you click on a specific course, it should show you a profile of that course including syllabi.)
• When the pandemic began in March 2020, Seattle University created a free two unit virtual “Engaging Seattle” course for first-time in college students.  The course explores Seattle’s many contractions through a lens of community engagement.  Faculty from multiple disciplines teach the course and co-design the syllabus including video lectures from faculty of various disciplines.  We’ve continued to offer the course since 2020. View the 2020 Engaging Seattle final report. 
• At University of Wisconsin we have a no-credit Canvas course (broadly available through Canvas Commons) and workshop curriculum that instructors/programs can use in part or as a whole for community-engaged courses – focuses on areas related to Madison’s community context, self-awareness, humility and power sharing. We’ve also recently added a section that serves as an introduction to community-based research.
• Relatedly, my dear colleagues (Elizabeth Tryon and Haley Madden) and I have a book coming out, Preparing students to engage in equitable community partnerships,  through Temple Press this fall that outlines our curriculum, educational resources, and other other topics we consider relevant to intro/prepare for service-learning. Also includes contributions from other boundary-spanners across the US. (discount code: use pre-order code PREF2023)