Independent Study in Service Learning

English 495 (special studies)
Professor Timothy Wandling
664-2796
Office hours T/TH 1-3 pm

This course will bring together students from several disciplines to discuss ways in which to further integrate service learning into the coursework at SSU. We will approach this problem both thematically (i.e., Homelessness, Environmentalism, etc.) as well as by considering how different disciplines might engage with these issues. We also will consider how our community partners conceptualize and address social issues and how these conceptions connect or fail to connect with academic approaches. We will seek to encourage a productive dialog between community partners and academics (both faculty and students) in order to address community issues.

Requirements:

• Work with OCBL or with Faculty member from another department as a Teaching Assistant
• One service learning resource project (web page or binder)
• Engaged discussion of readings.
• Support for and advocacy of service learning pedagogy.

Research assignment: Choose an area of focus for yourself upon which you will focus for the rest of the semester. Prepare to describe it to the group. Find three professors on campus whose courses would seem to relate to this issue. These professors need to be in at least two departments and need not be service learning courses. Out of this research will come your service learning resource project.

Schedule of Meetings and readings:

We will meet Friday afternoons from 1 3 on the following dates. Amy Stafford will schedule meetings with Americorps members on alternate Fridays. We will usually meet in Nichols 302.

August 31: Course introductions:

Sept. 14th: Engagement:
Mike Rose, from Possible Lives
Education

Sept. 28th: Call to action.
Martin Luther King, "Letter from Birmingham Jail"
Racial injustice.

Oct. 5th: Reflection.
Rachel Carson, from Silent Spring
Al Gore, Forward to new edition of Silent Spring

Oct. 19th. Connecting Service to Academic Learning Outcomes.
Selections from Voices from the Alley.
Homelessness

Nov. 2nd: Connection Academic Learning Outcomes to community issues. bell hooks, "Homeplace: A Site of Resistance" Gender/domestic violence

Nov. 9th: Reciprocity.
We will look at some service learning models for our reading this week.

Dec. 7th: Wrap up. Presentation of resource materials.
Edelman, on "Call to service"
Mike Rose, from Lives on the Boundaries

Ways to earn credit:

1 unit of English 495, Independent study in Service Learning Pedagogy for all who attend 6 of 7 class meetings, participate in workshops and in class reflection about service learning, and develop resource materials for the agency you are working with as well as one issue associated with that agency.

2-3 units of 495 for those students who wish to do all course readings, participate in the development of service learning materials for the SSU service learning community, and work to make connections with off-campus partners. Resource materials will be developed for multiple agencies and around several issues.

1-3 units of English CIP available for those students who wish to link a volunteer experience to this class. For each unit, students should spend 30 hours (2 per week) at the volunteer site. Reflective work will take place our seminar.