Service-learning as a force for organizational change

Citation

Holland, B.A. (2009), "Service-learning as a force for organizational change", International Journal of Organizational Analysis, Vol. 17 No. 1. https://doi.org/10.1108/ijoa.2009.34517aaa.003

Service-learning as a force for organizational change

Article Type: Commentaries From: International Journal of Organizational Analysis, Volume 17, Issue 1

 

Critics of higher education are fond of quipping that organisational change in higher education is an oxymoron and therefore, universities are increasingly conservative, inefficient, and costly. This overgeneralisation contributes to a global policy environment that largely sees higher education as an economic engine for technology transfer and workforce preparation. Considering current events and global problems, this narrow vocationalist view is perilous because it ignores the essential role education plays in generating new knowledge that enhances the human and social capital essential to healthy, stable, and safe communities.

Yet there is abundant evidence that higher education is making changes in response to new organisational practicalities and global realities. Three of the many forces for change are:

1. 1.

   The new student demographic – more diverse, more tech-savvy, more likely to be first in family and underprepared.

2. 2.

   The exit of baby boomers from the academic workforce.

3. 3.

   The rise of new modes of knowledge production (Gibbons et al., 1994).

These and other forces create incentives for tertiary institutions to become more intentional, coherent, and focused in their organisational structure, culture, and strategic actions. One indicator of greater intentionality is the rapid uptake of community engagement as a method of research and teaching that seeks to align the intellectual assets of the academy with practical knowledge-driven challenges and opportunities at the local, national, and global level. Service-learning, in particular, has been implemented around the world based on a growing body of evidence reporting benefits to student learning and development across a range of academic, social, civic, and personal outcomes. Service-learning engages students with each other and with communities in ways that inspire a love of inquiry and a desire to put knowledge into action for wider benefit.

Nonetheless, engaged strategies like service-learning generate resistance from some academics. Perhaps, this is because as the evidence base for active learning models like service-learning expands, the ineffectiveness of dominant pedagogies is increasingly obvious. With the forces for change in mind, one might consider the possibility that service-learning, like web-based learning, is a “canary in the mine” revealing the compelling need to make extensive changes to traditional curricular designs and to rethink the relationships between teaching, research, and the public role in creating new knowledge.

The time for tinkering with small changes is past. For the first time since the 1950s, higher education is now in a time of rapid and fundamental change to meet new knowledge conditions and demands. For both higher education and society, it’s about time.

Barbara A. HollandUniversity of Western Sydney, Sydney, Australia

About the author

Barbara A. Holland (PhD, University of Maryland) is Pro Vice-Chancellor (Engagement) and Professor at the University of Western Sydney. Previously, she served as Director of the Learn and Serve America National Service-Learning Clearinghouse in California and Senior Scholar at Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis. She is editor of Metropolitan Universities, the journal of the Coalition of Urban and Metropolitan Universities, co-editor of the Australasian Journal of Community Engagement, and co-editor of the book series Service-Learning Advances. She is co-author of Assessing Service-Learning and Community Engagement published by Campus Compact in 2001. Barbara A. Holland can be contacted at: b.holland@uws.edu.au