August 03, 2011
On June 27 and 28, 2011, 47 faculty members from nine
institutions gathered together in the D’Angelo Center at St. John’s
University for an Academic Service-Learning Faculty Development
Institute co-sponsored by St. John’s University and New York Campus
Compact. The Faculty Development Institute, entitled,
“Service-Learning and Your Institutional Mission,” prompted
participants to think about how service-learning connects to their
institution’s mission and were provided with information and
resources to further their knowledge of the Academic
Service-Learning pedagogy. Dr. Robin Wellington, Assistant Professor in
the
Department of Psychology found the program, “Extremely valuable
both in terms of material and the contacts/networking opportunity
to obtain ideas from others who have been incorporating
AS-L.”
Rev. James Maher, C.M., Executive Vice President
for Mission and Student Services began the session linking Academic
Service-Learning to their institution’s mission and or plan
highlighting that it is the integration of teaching, service and
research, which strategically enhances Academic
Service-Learning.
The Institute included several presenters and was facilitated by
Dr. Edward Zlotkowski, Professor of English at Bentley
University, who is known nationally and
internationally in the field of service-learning and is founder of
the Bentley Service-Learning Center. Throughout the program Dr.
Zlotkowski led participants in designing or re-designing their
course outlines to include an Academic Service-Learning component
and were encouraged to provide feedback to one another on their
outlines. At the end of the Institute, they had a newly designed
course outline, which included an Academic Service-Learning
component.
Working with Dr. Laurie
Worrall, Executive Director of New York
Campus Compact to plan the Institute Ms. Lynn
Stravino, Associate Director of Academic
Service-Learning indicated, “When you plan an event such as
this you never know who will attend. We could not have asked for a
more collegial group. It was exciting to see these gifted and
accomplished academics working together across disciplines and
institutions as they designed their service-learning
components.”
Additionally Dr. Natalie Byfield, Assistant
Professor of
Sociology at St. John’s University spoke about the inclusion of
Academic Service-Learning in her course, “Sociology of the Black
Experience” and how that project moved her research and publication
forward. Working with HerStory, an organization that provides a
prison based memoir writing program in the Suffolk County prison
system, Dr. Byfield collected data and worked with her students to
evaluate the effect and the efficacy of the HerStory approach as a
model for restorative justice. One of her students, recent St.
John’s graduate, Sadé Vaughn, spoke about her work on the project,
the impact it had on her academically and personally even providing
an opportunity for her to present the HerStory project at a another
conference.
Focusing on developing community partnerships, Mr. Anthony
Butler, Executive Director of St. John’s Bread and
Life, spoke about the importance of building meaningful service
experiences for students to exemplify the benefits of the
reciprocal relationships formed between community partners,
students, faculty and the institution of learning. He
discussed the projects that St. John’s students have been working
on at Bread and Life indicating that even the smallest project can
take off into a long- term, sustainable program.
The Institute concluded with a presentation by Dr. Barrett Brenton, Associate Professor of
Anthropology at St. John’s speaking about the importance of
reflection to link the service with the academics and how to grade
the reflections. He explained that students are graded on what they
learned from serving and the connection to their course learning
objectives and not the service itself.
At the end of the program, participants were awarded a certificate
of participation and many commented on how beneficial the program
was in better preparing them to use Academic Service-Learning in
their future courses. According to Dr. Anthony
Gabb, Assistant Professor in
Administration and Economics at St. John’s, “Unquestionably,
the event was interesting, informative and provocative!” For any
questions regarding the AS-L Faculty Institute or future AS-L
certifications, please contact Lynn Stravino at:
(718) 990-7902 or stravinl@stjohns.edu