Students promoting economic development and environmental sustainability

Abstract

Community‐based research has been suggested as a particularly effective form of service learning in college‐community collaborations. This paper reviews findings from interviews with alumni/ae and community partners of an environmental and economic sustainability center at Allegheny College in Northwest Pennsylvania, the Center for Economic and Environmental Development (CEED). CEED's community‐based research projects have spanned the natural and social sciences to analyze water quality, reduce waste streams and local energy consumption, identify environmental problems and enhance forest management. Interviews with alumni/ae point to the valued real world experience, enhanced cognitive development, and improved communication skills for students. Community partners valued new information and networks resulting from research and stressed the contribution they were making to college students' learning. Community‐based research projects can benefit from interviewees' recommendations to increase continuity, clarity of purpose, and follow‐through in projects, while maximizing opportunities for dialogue between community partners and students. Community‐based research may have a strong contribution to make to students' cognitive, academic, social, civic and career development.

Environmental service-learning approach in higher education – a descriptive case study on student-led life cycle assessments of university cafeteria meals

“…It is emphasized that service-learning should not be "for the community," but rather "with the community" (Ward and Wolf-Wendel, 2000). The research found that projects, like the hereby presented case study, benefit from a clarity of purpose (Keen and Baldwin, 2004) and increase students' civic engagement (Bringle and Hatcher, 2002;Parker et al, 2009). By engaging students in service-learning, it was suggested that the development of values related to diversity, poverty, social change and social responsibility, can be positively impacted (Bowman et al, 2010;Parker et al, 2009), likely also depending on the concrete service provided.…”

“…This strengthens the argument made by Ward and Wolf-Wendel (2000) that service-learning should not be for the community but with the community. IJSHE 22,7 6.3 Faculty members Those who design and teach the course can be easily forgotten in a service-learning approach (Keen and Baldwin, 2004) but are nevertheless essential (Kenworthy-U 'Ren, 2003;Kawabe et al, 2013;Salam et al, 2019). It is the responsibility of the faculty members to design a suitable service-learning course by achieving the academic, institutional, students' and community members' goals (Voss et al, 2015;Salam et al, 2019).…”

Sustainable development, education and literacy

“…Traditionally, students have lacked opportunity to put SD into practice (Steinemann, 2003), but this is a necessity if students are to be able to jointly create solutions (Wals and Jickling, 2002). There is also evidence that community based research can benefit both the student and the community involved, and helps to develop the ability to deal with the complexity of sustainable development issues (Keen and Baldwin, 2004). Furthermore, hands-on experience with sustainable development education at work can be incorporated into the course design itself; Jucker (2001) advises us to "practice what we preach", and redesigning the infrastructure of courses can be a good step (Steinemann, 2003).…”

Learning Experiences of a Participatory Approach to Educating for Sustainable Development in a South African Higher Education Institution Yielding Social Learning Indicators

“…The following empirical investigation was launched based on a conceptual-theoretical framework regarding the lived experiences of students who were involved in a community of practice where complex problems were solved through social interaction in a context. A community of practice helps to develop the ability to deal with the complexity of sustainable development matters [61]. The integration of participatory approaches in sustainable development practices can help to promote a culture of participation [62], and where group work is done it can generally aid to promote social and personal skills, but is not an effective method for improving learning [10].…”