Service Is an Integral Part \Of Education

APPLES, the program facilitating these courses, has been a fixture on campus since 1990. It was one of the first student-run service-learning organizations in the nation.

Service-learning courses have a number of benefits for college students. They often foster lifelong interest in service, create a service ethic and help students see the basis for policy formation and research. In a public university like UNC-CH, service-learning allows students to repay the investment the state has made in their education.

Andrew Angyal, an Elon College service-learning professor, said he thinks the liberal arts disciplines have become so specialized and driven by theoretical concerns that they've lost sight of their practical, humane values.

"If the humanities are going to make students more human, as I feel they should, it's going to happen in our service-learning courses," Angyal said.

Service-learning can greatly enhance the quality of learning available to students while benefiting universities and community organizations. The trend is expanding as universities around the state incorporate and expand programs of their own.

Faculty and staff interested in developing and enriching their universities' service-learning programs held a conference at Elon College on Tuesday to share ideas.

Faculty in Duke University's School of Education have combined a teaching methods course with work in the community. The students tutor local schoolchildren using the methods they learn in class, meanwhile learning and developing for themselves.

In Raleigh, Meredith University has interdisciplinary capstone courses that require the students to create an original service project for the community beyond Meredith's wrought-iron gates.

Other universities with only skeleton programs were at the conference looking for guidance. UNC-Wilmington and Peace College both have courses incorporating service into the curriculum, but no service-learning program.

Conference attendees described the new attention to service-learning as a bandwagon taking hold of the nation's higher education. As opposed to the smoking and drinking bandwagons we learned about in middle school, this is one everyone should hop on.

University presidents from across the state will gather tomorrow at Elon College to discuss a merger of conference sponsor N.C. Campus Volunteers with a national organization called Campus Compact.

But despite the national attention, many service-learning programs are stalling. Faculty and staff from the universities agreed that without institutional support, service-learning courses are too time consuming for young professors working to gain tenure.

Mark Ford, Wake Forest University's director of student development, said younger faculty have responded well to his efforts to foster institutional support for service-learning.

"(We show) it's not only a good thing and consistent with the liberal arts mission, but faculty get rewards for it too," Ford said.

Trends in education can sometimes be dangerous, but this is a no-lose situation. Professors can integrate real-world experiences into their curriculum, students get to apply their lessons to something tangible and community organizations receive dedicated volunteers.

UNC-CH and APPLES are models of everything service-learning can be. It's fabulous that other institutions are joining in to enhance their students' educations, both inside and outside the classroom.