3 Table Test
Key Takeaways
Our findings on the S-L design and delivery features associated with positive student outcomes also appear in several of the S-L course attributes (e.g., community activities, critical reflection, diversity of interaction) in IUPUI S-L taxonomy and in a few dimensions of SLQAT (e.g., the course design, learning, student dimensions). Used as a developmental tool, the three levels in the IUPUI S-L taxonomy and four levels in SLQAT could allow instructors to self-assess the current quality of their S-L courses against those attributes/dimensions and provide them directions to enhance the quality of the next offering of their modules/courses. These frameworks could also be used to obtain feedback from students on the quality of different attributes of S-L courses beyond the ones studied in this research.
| Diploma | S-L module | Type of S-L project—brief description of S-L project | Semester/ Level | No. of students surveyed | No. of students interviewed | No. of community members surveyed |
| Arts business management | Festival & event management | Direct—conduct one or two arts activities for older persons (with financial) at senior activity center | Apr 2017/Year 2 | 27/37 | 4 | 0 |
| Apr 2018/Year 2 | 36/39 | 2 | 0 | |||
| Business & social enterprise | Project management | Direct and indirect—plan and carry out projects in collaboration with social enterprises or non-profit organization | Apr 2017/Year 2 | 34/40 | 1 | 4 |
| Apr 2018/Year 2 | 30/36 | 2 | 6 | |||
| Early childhood education | Developing family school community partnership | Indirect and direct— create program and product to enhance parental involvement, conduct survey on parenting | Apr 2017/Year 2 | 125/195 | 4 | 0 |
| Direct—conduct program to enhance parental involvement at preschools and childcare centers | Apr 2018/Year 2 | 155/228 | 2 | 2 | ||
| Chinese studies | Modern Chinese literature | Direct/indirect—promote Chinese language and the Chinese literary association by conducting story reading sessions for children in public libraries | Oct 2017/Year 2 | 29/29 | 4 | 0 |
| Apr 2018/Year 2 | 32/39 | 2 | 4 | |||
| Chinese Media communication | News reporting & feature writing | Direct—conduct two outings for older persons from a social club | Oct 2017/Year 1 | 40/43 | 4 | 0 |
| Child psychology & early education | Collaboration with family & community | Direct and indirect—conduct programs to enhance parental involvement, survey low-income families with young children, create teaching materials for childcare center | Apr 2018/Year 2 | 212/266 | 2 | 0 |
| Psychology studies | Managing disabilities | Direct—conduct programs for persons with disabilities | Oct 2017/Year 1 | 54/54 | 4 | 7 |
| Behavior modification & intervention | Indirect—conduct survey to assess views, carry out anti-cyberbullying campaign in different schools at NP | Oct 2017/Year 2 | 33/54 | 4 | 3 | |
| Tamil studies in early education | Communication in Tamil II | Direct—conduct skit in Tamil for preschoolers | Oct 2017/Year 1 | 25/29 | 4 | 0 |
| Total | 832/1089
(76.4%) |
|||||
Additionally, we learned from S-L course instructors that they appreciated the opportunity to reflect on the delivery of their S-L modules through our interviews. We, therefore, also advocate that instructors have a learning conversation with S-L pedagogical trainers or more experienced S-L course instructors at various stages of their induction into S-L pedagogy. That conversation could involve the use of tools such as IUPUI S-L taxonomy (Bringle et al., 2017; Hahn et al., 2017) and the SLQAT (Furco et al., 2017) to explore their perception of the quality of their current S-L courses.
Procedure
|
STUDENT OUTCOMES |
| Civic outcomes—9 items Cronbach’s α = .89 (N = 832) |
| I often try to act on solutions that address social, local, or international problems in the community. |
| I try to encourage others to participate in activities that help to improve the community. |
| I am aware of what can be done to meet the important needs in the community. |
| I am aware of the important needs in the community. |
| I feel I have the ability to make a difference in the community. |
| I plan to find time or a way to make a positive difference in the community. |
| I participate in activities that help to improve the community. |
| Being concerned about local or international issues is an important responsibility for everybody. |
| Being informed about social issues is a good way to improve the community. |
| Academic connection—4 items Cronbach’s α = .88 (N = 832) |
| This service-learning experience helped me to learn the academic content of the module. |
| Concepts learnt in this module helped me to perform my service-learning well. |
| This service-learning experience allowed me to apply things I have learned in class to real issues/situations. |
| The academic material came alive for me in this service-learning experience. |
| Career preparation—3 items Cronbach’s α = .81 (N = 832) |
| This service-learning experience helped me to gain a clear idea of my career goals. |
| This service-learning experience helped with my decision-making about the career that I will pursue in future. |
| This service-learning experience allowed me to gauge my readiness for the workplace. |
| S-L DESIGN AND DELIVERY FEATURES |
| Perceived impact of S-L—5 items Cronbach’s α = .86 (N = 832) |
| Many of the tasks I performed for this service-learning made/will make a significant contribution to others’ well-being. |
| This service-learning experience has increased my interest in participating in community service/volunteer activities. |
| This service-learning experience caused me to feel more concerned about social issues. |
| In this service-learning experience, I had opportunities to make a meaningful contribution to the community. |
| I am more confident of my ability to make a difference in the community after this service-learning experience. |
| Perceived preparedness for S-L—3 items Cronbach’s α = .71 (N = 832) |
| Before the S-L project/activities/ideas, I understood the S-L project and my role in it. |
| Before the S-L project/activities/ideas, I understood the purpose and objective of S-L in this module. |
| I am interested in this community that I worked with. |
| Perceived quality of reflection prompts—7 items Cronbach’s α = .93 (N = 832) |
| The reflection questions helped me to articulate my learning. |
| The reflection questions clearly linked the service experience to the module content and learning objectives. |
| The reflection questions were structured with clear directions and guidelines. |
| The reflection questions helped me to deepen and broaden my thinking. |
| The reflection questions helped me to describe my experiences with specific examples and detail. |
| The reflection questions helped me to think critically. |
| The reflection questions helped me to examine my own assumptions, beliefs and values. |
| Perceived frequency of reflection—2 items Cronbach’s α = .54 (N = 832) |
| For this S-L module, we have had ___ small group reflection(s) (discussions/activities) on the S-L with my lecturer/tutor.
Response options: 0, 1, 2, 3, 4 and above |
| For this SL module, I had done ___ written reflection(s).
Response options: 0, 1, 2, 3, 4 and above |
| Perceived amount of interaction with community members—1 item |
| I spent ___ hours interacting directly with the community that I serve.
Response options: 0 hour, 1–5 hours, 6–10 hours, 11–15 hours, 16 hours and above |
The survey that community partners completed was adapted from Gelmon, Holland, Driscoll, Spring, and Kerrigan (2006). Responses for these items were also on the five-point scale of (1) Strongly Disagree to (5) Strongly Agree.
| Interpersonal development | ||
| Themes | Sub-themes | Sample quotes |
| Interacting and working with community members | Interacting with a group they do not really interact with | Nowadays, we rarely have the time to interact with other people, like, we are busy with ourselves, we want to study; we want to do things on our own. We really don’t know how to interact with other people, especially elderly, because of the age gap. But then through the experience, we get to talk to them … I find myself more confident. I am willing to talk to them more and find out more about their lives. [3] |
| Being compelled to initiate interaction | The elderly[that] I was paired with was a little bit more on the quiet side. So you really have to probe and be very active, be a bit more thick-skinned in talking to them. So I think that was something that helped me in my personal growth. [5] | |
| Developing communication skills of (future) profession—with children | A lot of children didn’t want to talk to us [after the storybook reading]. I realized that, instead of [asking them], “Do you like cars?” you say, “You like car-car? You like dinosaur?” then they will respond, “Ya, I like, I like,” then they will talk to you … [Say] you’re a teacher and you want to share what you know but aren’t getting a response, change yourself and talk to them in their way, so you can get a response. [22] | |
| Developing communication skills of (future) profession—with child’s parents | Some parents might be a bit panicky even when they come in because they don’t know what to do. So I learned to understand their anxiety and also to guide them through the entire process because some parents might be new to this kind of program. [14] | |
| Working with group members | Being more forthcoming in voicing opinions | If I cannot really get along with you in work, I will just keep quiet about it and just wait for the whole thing to end. But I think, for this S-L module, opinions have to be voiced out in order to ensure that this whole project is successful, I learned how to voice out my opinion in a way that doesn’t harm or hurt anyone, and then resolve the conflicts from there. [17] |
| Resolving differences and conflict | It wasn’t the easiest or the most smooth-sailing process because of differences in our group … even like wedging different views in my group, having to sort it out and having to work out our differences, that made me grow a lot as a person because you have to develop more of a professional mindset when we’re doing this kind of thing; we cannot let our personal feelings get in the way. [16] | |
| Learning to work with disliked group member (but change seemed transient) | I’ve students telling me “Oh, I realize that I can work with people I don’t like.” This time round we expanded the group size a little so they might work with people that are not from their own cliques … She said, “We still talk. At least I can work with her, at least I know I don’t hate her now.” [L10a]
[At first] some cried, “I cannot work with this person—extreme reactions—but we forced it through, then they changed. They wrote [in their reflection] “I see differently.” But then upcoming semester, we gave them the criteria: you form groups based on common social cause, cannot be your best friend, yet they go back to their cliques. [L11a] |
|
| Bonding as a team | I had a really good team. So we’re really bonded … we had a lot of work to do in this whole service-learning project and we split it really well. It’s not like when we split our work, we will just do our own [part]. We’ll always help each other; we’re relying on each other like one whole team. [21] | |
| Interacting and working with external partners | Professionalism in communication | In school, we’re always very informal with our friends and lecturers. But when we go out there and actually work with the organization, we actually learn how to talk professional [sic]. [11] |
| Professionalism in written communication | Students write to you, very childish but when you make them work with external partners, they start to be conscious of the language to use. (WhatsApp group with partners and me). I modeled for them also in the way I write to the partner. Then they see, they learned very fast. So they would say “thank you,” “please.” They write a lot of all these, “If you don’t mind, this is what we will propose. Let us know your thoughts.” They’re very pro now. They talked to the partner. Very careful. Very mindful. This, I can see. Now they talk to me also like that. “Thank you, Mr J.” [L11a] | |
| Learning to take perspective of community partner and being tactful | You really have to consider their positions, speak with tact, allow them to understand you and also relate to you … our community partner was quite condescending; he will speak very rudely so he won’t really consider your feelings so you really have to work around him, like walk on the edge. So it’s very difficult. [9] | |
| Learning to say no | During this whole project, it actually taught me a lot like I should voice my own opinion and not being stepped over on, like, if the stakeholder is asking for too much, it’s actually ok to say no. [7] | |
| Leadership | Being thrust into leadership position | [I developed leadership skills] because I had this picture in my mind, so I had to, kind of, assume the leader position and tell them what I visualized and what materials to prepare, what steps we should take. [30] |
| Thinking through consequences of decision | I learned how to be responsible. Because my team’s mistake is also my mistake as well, because that’s what my instructions were … I learned that every action that I [take] will have consequence, if I didn’t think properly. So it taught me to think through what I want to do first before even carrying it out in the first place. [7] | |
| Bringing the whole team along | I can really think far ahead but then some of my group mates they need just a little more time to catch up … and walk on par with the rest of us … But then, in this group of five, it was a different dynamic. So I have to like, “Okay, you understand? Everybody on the same page?” Just give that few minutes. [13] | |
| Empowering leader to re-assign team members’ roles by strengths | At the start, they didn’t know each other. The leader just assigned, you—logistics, you—volunteer management, you—budget. Then cannot work. Halfway through the leader came and see me, then I said, “Look again at their personalities. You now know them more.” I empowered him. Then he changed. You—volunteer management, blossom. You—do the program, blossom. [L11a] | |
| Responding appropriately to challenging situation | [The team leader], at the implementation phase, really held everything together because during the rehearsal, our community partner was very demanding … on the stage, the show manager would just say, “your singing sucks, you know,” that kind. How would a teenager feel? [The team leader] was the one who got his friends to go and sing. So he felt the need to mediate. His friend said, “I don’t want to do this already. I’m out. I do it because of you only. If I get this kind of treatment, forget it.” Then he walked out. [The team leader] was very good. He is, by nature, quite confrontational, explosive, flip-table type. But I saw how his maturity took over. Very cool. At the back, he pacified his friend. The friend, after all this, went back to practice. [L11b] | |
| Being assertive and adept at negotiation | I specifically told the leaders that they need to be assertive but of course in a very courteous, respectful way to the partners. Know when to say no and also define their personal and team objectives well, and what’s in it for them … As was evidenced in some leaders, they really went ahead and negotiated and stated their ground: what they can do and what they cannot do. [L11b] | |
| Personal development | ||
|---|---|---|
| Themes | Sub-themes | Sample quotes |
| Changing perceptions and challenging assumptions | Reducing/debunking stereotype | We always feel that the elderly can’t do this, can’t do that. But then when we were there, they actually love [our activities], and they actually can do very well. The first time we went, we did Bingo and some karaoke sessions. So they really love singing. Then the second time we went, we did canvas painting and silk screen painting, and they love it also. We found out that they are actually not that different from us. They enjoy the same things as us. [3]
I used to think like [the migrant workers] were very shady people and they were nothing good to be around with. But after my [S-L project] event, I realized that they are actually full of dreams, aspirations. Some of the migrants who attended my event were actually teachers back in Bangladesh but because it wasn’t paying much, so they came over to Singapore … It’s very sad to think how I used to view them, like bad people just because they are different in skin color and then, now, once I get to know them, they are actually very good people too. [7] |
| I think, based on what the students said, they [had] never really talked to elderly. [To] young people, they are just old. But I think because the students are forced to spend hours with them for each trip, so they talked. And then some of the students shared that they hear interesting stories. You know, the seniors have life stories to share that sometimes the students just don’t see otherwise. So I think that‘s the change. [L2] | ||
| Changing attitude and behavior toward S-L—from being reluctant to putting in effort | We found it a bit frustrating because we didn’t really learn a lot of things during the lecture, and we still needed to give up our two lecture [slots] to go for this service-learning. [And] we’re going out to do it; we need to interact with them; we need to interview them … But after we went for the service-learning, we find it very fun. I think we really want to do it. [25] | |
| Right from the start, they were quite reluctant to go down because all of the sessions fall on Saturday. They complained why on a Saturday then I have to explain … I think after the session, they felt tired, but in a way, they also felt rewarded … and I can see that they are more committed. They even changed the props which I did not ask them to change because they felt that the props from the first run were not so solid, not so good. So they re-did everything. And they came up with better props [to represent the donkey]. [L5b] | ||
| Growth in civic attitudes and behaviors | One of the biggest advantage of service-learning is it’s not fake. Everything you do impact lives. Students, although their grades are at the back of their minds, they know, “Hey, that family is waiting there. The woman who sewed a teddy bear, I must sell it for her.” They wrote that [in their reflections]. [L11a] | |
| Appreciation/gratitude | When I helped those families, I can see that because the parents have to work a lot and the children need to go school, they have very little time together. It makes me feel appreciative of the time that I spent with my parents and family members. [15] | |
| Greater self-knowledge/awareness | Realizing that I can | I was a bit scared. I was not very familiar with elderly so I don’t really know how to talk to them, how to approach them. But after this experience, I find it’s actually not so bad. So something I discovered was, “Oh, I actually can do this.” [5] |
| Realizing that I’m more capable than I thought | I usually [was] more of a team member than a team leader. Then, when I was forced into the team leader position for the other projects, I realized that I’m actually quite competent, in a sense because the other project, we got an A+. If I didn’t step in, we really can’t go far because like 70% [of it] was my idea, my effort … So I felt that I was more capable than I thought. [30] | |
| Recognizing personal weakness | One personal weakness that I found out through this experience was that I’ve a tendency to not take the perspective of the learners. In one of the activities, I was introducing [a topic on] emotions to the children but I didn’t realize that the picture of the emotion was facing my direction. Because we were sitting in circle, the children on my side could see but the children opposite could not see. So I failed to realize that. I only realized it after my lecturer pointed that out. So that was a weakness that I found out. [29] | |
| Realizing undesirable traits in self and changed | I used to be very possessive of my own project, like, “If this is my work, then this is my work. Don’t come and criticize it.” But then after reflecting, I realized that the community partner’s feedback is actually very useful. So after a while I told myself I need to let go. [32] | |
| I had two students who, even in class, were not punctual. They were not committed to their group. It kind of started at the start of the service. Then I sat the whole group down and talked about it. So I think for them, they realized that I am serious about this, they need to be committed to the group and to the organization, and I think there is an improvement in terms of professional behavior expected. [L3] | ||
| Strengthening character and professional traits | Adaptive; quick thinking | There were a lot of hiccups with our service-learning. I’m not someone who is very fast in adapting but I guess at that point in time, I was being forced and pushed to adapt … The [stationary] bus that we were supposed to conduct our indoor activity broke down. We were short of one member, and we had to split our group of five, all of sudden, to conduct one activity indoor and one outdoor, and we changed another activity. We just split up naturally and then we just do it. [17] |
| Perseverance | Through this S-L experience, we actually go out and talk to people that we don’t know, like strangers … My friends and I were a bit shy and embarrassed to go up to the parents to talk to them, but after multiple tries, we actually became more confident. We showed perseverance too because not everybody that you ask will actually answer you. Some will ignore and not participate … We didn’t really give up so we managed to get quite a number of survey responses. So it really helps us to grow as a person. [11] | |
| Resilience | They really just complained and whined to one another. Then they talked to me, “Miss, why like that? Why so rush?” Because after the change, they had to rush to prepare the proposal presentation. And then we told them that the implementation would be in July but some had to start end of June. So that was when I explained to them that life is unpredictable, “I know it’s a sudden change. You got to plan at the last minute but you just got to do what you’ve got to do.” So that’s where they learned the resilience. [L6] | |
| Patience | I think I’ve grown to be a more patient person. To handle the kids is one thing, I mean, you [also] have to be patient to answer their questions because they have many questions to ask which are not related. But you still have to answer. [39] | |
| Initiative | For our sessions, we have to be early, like an hour earlier, to prepare all our materials. Then after the session, we also have to pack up. So actually, you must be on time, then you must know what is happening during the whole session. Then take initiative. You see anything that needs your help, then you just do it, even though it’s not your responsibility. [6] | |
| Having limited personal growth | Having done such things before | I think for me it’s about the same because I’d interacted with small children before. So it’s just like more of a reinforcement of how to interact with them. [22] |
| No opportunity for leadership | I don’t stand out; the group leaders were the main facilitators. I don’t think I’ve got any strength. [1] | |
| Behaving in a self-entitled way | The two students walked with the elderly, just following them around. Then one of them actually let the elderly hold the umbrella for her [to shield them from the sun]. I went there a few times, I [said], “Do you want to take the umbrella?” She replied, “But my elderly said she wants to hold it.” And I chided, “Then you let her?” [L2] | |
| Lacking a sense of responsibility | I said “Where are the other two group members?” Then they had no choice but to tell me. They were at one of the back lanes [in the area]. They were still painting the bottles, which I was very upset about. What if the children hold it and it’s all sticky? I said, “On implementation day, you shouldn’t be preparing your materials anymore; they should be ready.” [L8b] | |
Career Preparation
A single-sample t test showed that the career preparation mean score of 3.78, SD = 0.77, t(831) = 29.28, p < .01, was significantly greater than the neutral/mid-point (3.0), following S-L. Students perceived positive impact in career preparation through their S-L experiences. Qualitative findings from students’ interviews largely supported these results. Most student interviewees found that the S-L project helped them (a) clarify their career direction, and (b) gain insights into what is required in the job, while a few students reported limited development in their career preparation.
S-L Design and Delivery Features Associated with Student Outcomes
Pearson correlations showed positive and significant relationships between S-L design and delivery features (i.e., perceived preparedness for S-L, perceived impact of S-L, perceived quality of reflection prompts) and change in civic outcomes score (rs ranged from .21 to .34, p <.01), academic connection (rs ranged from .61 to .79, p <.01), and career preparation (rs ranged from .61 to .73, p <.01). Spearman correlations showed weak positive and significant relationships between the amount of interaction students had with the community and change in civic outcomes score r(831) = .17, p <.01. There were positive and significant correlations between S-L features (i.e., perceived amount of interaction with community and perceived frequency of reflection) and academic connection (rs ranged from .17 to .23, p <.01) and career preparation (rs ranged from .14 to .16, p <.01) (see Table 4).
| Change in civic outcomes
r |
Academic connection
r |
Career preparation
r |
|
|---|---|---|---|
| S-L designs and delivery features | |||
| Perceived impact of S-L | .34** | .77** | .73** |
| Perceived preparedness for S-L | .21** | .61** | .61** |
| Perceived quality of reflection prompts | .30** | .79** | .70** |
| Perceived frequency of reflection | .031 | .23†† | .16†† |
| Perceived amount of interaction with community | .17†† | .17†† | .14†† |
** Pearson’s correlation, p < .01†† Spearman’s correlation, p < .01
The data analyses revealed that better perceived student outcomes were associated with students’ more favorable perceptions of the impact of the S-L project, preparedness for S-L, and quality of reflection prompts, as well as greater amount of interaction with the community and more frequent reflection activities.
Discussion
This study confirmed the expected results that S-L would be associated with positive student outcomes and marks an advance in the field of S-L and S-L research in several ways. In terms of the research objectives to evaluate the impact of S-L on civic outcomes, academic connection, personal growth, and career preparation in Ngee Ann Polytechnic, Singapore, the findings are consistent with positive results from many efficacy studies in Western settings (Astin et al., 2000; Celio et al., 2011; Yorio & Ye, 2012) and support the generalizability and transferability of the good outcomes from S-L to a polytechnic setting in Singapore. With its large sample size of over 800 student-participants and inclusion of career preparation outcomes, which is very much the nation’s focus in SkillsFuture (Government of Singapore, 2019), this study provides support for S-L as a high-impact pedagogy that can potentially enhance a range of learning outcomes.
Implications for Faculty Development
To date, more than 400 academic staff have been trained in S-L at NP, and this is an ongoing effort (Tang & Bringle, 2019). Undeniably, a lot of work goes into the design of a quality S-L course, and scaffolding of training may be necessary in order that new S-L course instructors are not overwhelmed12 while they build the quality of existing S-L courses. Making decisions on the questions in Table 5 might be a good start for new S-L course instructors to focus on one or two key S-L features at the start of their S-L journey and gradually incorporate other features in the subsequent offering of the course.
| S-L design and delivery features | Questions |
| Impact value of S-L project | What S-L project would allow students to make meaningful contribution?
Is it adequately challenging? |
| Amount of interaction with community | What are the opportunities for interaction with the community member? |
| Civic learning | What social issue would be addressed through the project?
At which points of the S-L experience are discussion of the social issue and civic learning most appropriate? |
| Academic connection/learning | What academic concepts would students apply?
What opportunities in the S-L project are available for students to apply these concepts? What reflection prompts would help students make the academic connection? |
| Reflection (quality, frequency) | How should the reflection prompts be phrased for easy understanding?
What reflection activities are beneficial before, during, and after S-L? |
| Preparing students for S-L | What are potential challenges that students could be prepared for? |
Additionally, we learned from S-L course instructors that they appreciated the opportunity to reflect on the delivery of their S-L modules through our interviews. We, therefore, also advocate that instructors have a learning conversation with S-L pedagogical trainers or more experienced S-L course instructors at various stages of their induction into S-L pedagogy. That conversation could involve the use of tools such as IUPUI S-L taxonomy (Bringle et al., 2017; Hahn et al., 2017) and the SLQAT (Furco et al., 2017) to explore their perception of the quality of their current S-L courses.
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