About Service-Learning
The Wisconsin Institute for Public Policy and Service promotes and facilitates service-learning projects across the UW Colleges and UW–Extension. WIPPS promotes service-learning as a meaningful experience for students along the learning continuum, from K -12 to college, that can take place in a number of formal and informal educational settings.
WIPPS believes that service-learning activities exemplify pedagogical "best practices" by encouraging knowledge-gathering and retention in conjunction with outcomes that offer real-world applications. By participating in service-learning projects, individuals access and benefit from school and university resources and find opportunities to apply academic concepts to real-world settings and enhance their learning.
What are the characteristics of effective service-learning experiences?
They are positive, meaningful, and real to the participants. - They involve cooperative rather than competitive experiences and thus promote skills associated with teamwork, community involvement, and citizenship.
- They address complex problems in complex settings rather than simplified problems in isolation.
- They offer opportunities to engage in problem-solving by requiring participants to gain knowledge of the specific context of their service-learning activity and community challenges (rather than only drawing upon generalized or abstract knowledge). As a result, service-learning offers powerful opportunities to acquire the habits of critical thinking, especially the ability to identify the most important questions or issues within a real-world situation.
- They promote deeper learning because the results are immediate and uncontrived. There are no "right answers" in the back of the book.
- They are more likely to: be personally meaningful to participants; generate emotional consequences; challenge values as well as ideas; and support social, emotional, and cognitive learning and development.
(Photo this page: UWMC student prepares materials for a curriculum-based service-learning project)