Abstract
The purpose of this study was to describe the knowledge, skills, and abilities (KSAs) undergraduate psychology students were able to articulate while engaging in a career preparation seminar with an embedded service-learning internship. Results from the students’ reflective journals indicated students were able to describe a wide range of KSAs used and gained in their service-learning internship: communication skills, interpersonal skills, and working effectively with diverse populations. Although students were initially apprehensive about the time commitment, ultimately they found it was manageable and worthwhile; they reported enjoying helping others, gaining necessary workplace skills, increasing their knowledge of diversity, and learning more about the value of their psychology degree.
With varying degrees of confusion and concern “What are you going to do with a psychology major” is often asked of undergraduates pursuing a degree in psychology. Career options for undergraduate psychology majors are less obvious than other majors, especially if students are not interested in pursuing clinical psychology. However, psychology programs prepare students for a wide range of careers. Psychology students are developing knowledge, skills, and abilities (KSAs) in areas such as mathematics and statistics, computing, research, and critical thinking (Borden & Rajecki, 2000). These KSAs will serve students well in their future careers, regardless of the field they enter.
During a 5-year study, Borden and Rajecki (2000) distributed surveys to recent college graduates, finding despite having this broad skill set, over 37% of recent psychology graduates reported being in careers “not at all related” to their major while only 22.9% reported having careers “directly related” to their major. In contrast, 96.3% of health professionals, 77% of social work majors, and 72.3% of education majors reported having careers “directly related” to their degree. Compared to other majors, psychology students may struggle to articulate the valuable KSAs they develop in their course work and how the KSAs transfer to the professional world of work. Once in the workplace, psychology alumni may not be making connections between their career and their undergraduate education.
In the same survey, psychology majors also represented the smallest proportion of graduates who felt they were “very much prepared” for their postgraduation job, only 16.1% selected this response (Borden & Rajecki, 2000). This compares to 73% of health professionals and 46% of education majors who felt “very much prepared.” Psychology undergraduates may need more opportunity to practice their nascent KSAs and learn about the broad transferability of their KSAs to better prepare for the workforce. This issue needs to be addressed, as being able to describe relevant experiences and articulate one’s KSAs is necessary in graduate school applications and job interviews.
According to Dillinger and Landrum (2002), seminar courses focused on career preparation may help prepare psychology majors for their future careers. Seminar courses can help lower division students make career decisions and become aware of opportunities. Service learning may be another useful addition to a seminar course that prepares students for the professional world of work. Through service learning, students can learn about the KSAs they are gaining in their courses, apply what they are learning, place their KSAs in context, understand the value of those KSAs, and explore related careers.
The value of service learning in achieving a variety of outcomes has been widely studied. Researchers have documented that service-learning students make gains in career development (Conway, Amel, & Gerwien, 2009; Kretchmar, 2001), self-efficacy, interpersonal and leadership skills (Astin, Vogelgesang, Ikeda, & Yee, 2000), critical thinking and problem-solving skills (Ferrari & Leonard, 1996), and develop a stronger sense of self (Jones & Abes, 2004).
In an effort to help students more explicitly link KSAs they gained in psychology classes to relevant KSAs they would need in the workplace, the first author designed a career course that contained a service-learning requirement. The focus of this study was to describe the KSAs psychology undergraduates articulate as they complete a seminar focused on career exploration and preparation while undertaking a service-learning internship.
Method
Seminar Course
This course, which is required for sophomore psychology students at the first author’s university, aims to help students describe the KSAs they are learning throughout the major and how those KSAs can be applied to future careers. In the course, students explore career and graduate school options while learning how to set goals and prepare for their future. Students complete readings each week (e.g., Appleby & Appleby, 2006; Hettich, 2010), engage in class discussions, talk with guest speakers, and complete assignments including creating resumes, writing occupation summaries, and giving career presentations. In addition, students engage in a 20-hr service-learning internship and write reflective journals about their experiences. Service-learning internships are prearranged by the course instructor with the assistance of student affairs staff. Select sites are shown in Table 1. Students are matched to a site, participate in an interview with the site supervisor, and begin their service-learning internship by the fourth week of the 15-week semester. Students engage in roughly 2 hr of service learning each week for the remainder of the semester.
Select Service Sites and Activities.
Participants
Taught at a mid-sized private liberal arts university in a major metropolitan area, this course enrolls roughly 15 students each semester. The undergraduate college is a women’s college, thus all of the participants were women. The data for this study were collected over three semesters beginning in the fall of 2010. Twelve students gave us consent to use de-identified journals for research purposes. The course was taught by the first author; the second and third authors were students in the course.
Materials
Students wrote four reflective journals throughout the semester. In the first two journals, students reflected upon and answered the following questions including: What apprehensions do you have about your service-learning internship? What are you learning about the professional “world of work”? What KSAs have you used in your work at the service-learning site? What is one challenge or issue you have encountered in your work at the service-learning site?
A few questions in the third and fourth reflective journals were as follows: What did you learn about the organization and the people with whom you worked? Go back to your first journal and review your original apprehensions. Describe what happened to them. What KSAs did you gain or deepen from this experience? What did you learn about psychology through your service-learning internship?
Procedure
After course grades were submitted at the end of each semester, the first author e-mailed students requesting permission to use their de-identified journals for research purposes. Students who consented e-mailed their journals to the first author. The final course grade for students who consented ranged from a C− to an A; these students did not differ demographically from others in the course.
The reflective journals were analyzed to gain a deeper understanding of the impact the service-learning internship had on students, in their own words (Kuh & Andreas, 1991; Patton, 2002). We also wanted to understand the apprehensions and challenges students encountered. Each researcher independently read and coded the data, with the three overarching categories of knowledge, skills, and abilities as a guiding framework (Pope, Ziebland, & Mays, 2000). As subcategories within each of the three overarching categories began to emerge from the data (i.e., course knowledge, communication skills, flexibility, etc.), the researchers used the constant comparative method (Glaser & Strauss, 1967) to compare each new instance to the subcategories, forming new subcategories when necessary. After each researcher coded the data separately, we compared our results, discussed agreements and disagreements, and created the final subcategories with journal excerpts. The fourth author provided a final set of coding; the percentage agreement between the final subcategories and the fourth author are provided in the next section.
Results
We will first describe the apprehensions students had going into the service-learning internship, then KSAs students identified using and gaining, and challenges encountered.
Apprehensions
Prior to beginning their service-learning internship, students wrote about their apprehensions. The primary apprehension was the time commitment, followed by interacting with diverse populations, engaging in a new experience, and meeting expectations. Student quotes are included in Table 2. Agreement was 1.00 for apprehensions.
Student Apprehensions.
KSAs Used and Gained
Knowledge
Students identified using and gaining a wide range of knowledge (see Table 3). Agreement was .88 for knowledge. Students described gaining knowledge about diverse groups of people, including highly mobile populations, children, people with disabilities, people convicted of crimes, and people experiencing poverty. Students also described learning how people in disadvantaged situations were not as different from themselves as previously thought. Students also frequently mentioned using and gaining a greater understanding of knowledge learned in their Introductory, Developmental, and Abnormal Psychology courses as well as the seminar course itself.
Knowledge Used and Gained.
Importantly, students also recognized psychology’s applicability to the workforce. Students discovered they were using their psychology knowledge when they were interacting with clients; knowledge of how individuals develop, experience trauma, and struggle with mental illness allowed them to effectively work with others. Further, students described how their knowledge can be applied to numerous fields of work.
Students also frequently described learning the world of work is not as organized or as predictable as a classroom, and rules and expectations are not always flexible. Students reported learning the importance of commitments, the variety of skills necessary to succeed in the workplace, and the necessity of balancing various roles in the workplace.
Skills
Students frequently described using and gaining communication skills, including giving clear directions, rephrasing information, talking with others, and listening (see Table 4). Agreement was .97 for the final categories. This included learning what was appropriate to say to clients and coworkers. Students also described using and developing strong interpersonal and teamwork skills. In their service-learning internships, students found themselves initiating conversations, delegating tasks, being careful to speak when appropriate, and collaborating. Students reported learning to work through tension and cooperate with diverse individuals.
Skills Used and Gained.
Students also described using leadership skills: taking initiative, demonstrating confidence, modeling behaviors, enforcing rules, planning classes, teaching, and leading groups. Importantly, students learned how to fairly enforce rules while maintaining positive relationships with clients. Students also reported using their creativity, organization, conflict resolution, boundary setting, and observational skills.
Abilities
An ability many students described gaining was acting quickly and flexibly, including changing plans at the last minute, fulfilling multiple roles within a situation, completing unanticipated tasks, working with what was available, and coming up with alternative activities when an original activity failed (see Table 5). Agreement was .97 for these statements. Students repeatedly described using and gaining patience while working with clients. Students described motivating others including having a positive attitude and providing encouragement, key abilities gained in their service-learning internship. Students also wrote that they gained confidence.
Abilities Used and Gained.
Challenges
Throughout their work in the service-learning internship, students encountered a variety of challenges (see Table 6). Agreement was .87 for challenges. Challenges students reported most often focused on the operation of the service-learning internship site. For instance, many students reported issues related to the lack of organization and communication among workers. Some students had difficulties communicating with their supervisors. Other students felt their sites were not managed well, encountering times when there was no work for them to do. Students also reported challenging interactions with clients, such as learning how to handle children’s behaviors and learning how and when to establish boundaries.
Challenges Students Encountered.
Discussion
Our analysis of reflective journals revealed that students who participated in the seminar course and service-learning internship gained valuable experiences and articulated a variety of KSAs, demonstrating an understanding of how the KSAs can be valuable in the workforce. Students learned more about the value of their psychology degree and the broad array of career opportunities available to them. The seminar course with service-learning internship facilitated students’ understanding of course concepts while allowing them the opportunity to practice their developing skills and abilities in the workplace. Students reported developing an appreciation for diversity including understanding the unique situations of the clients and communities with whom they interacted. As a result, students built relationships and learned how they could help others. The course and service-learning internship also provided students with a structured opportunity to reflect upon everything they were learning and discuss their thoughts and feelings with peers and their professor.
Unfortunately, this study is limited in that only one third of students in the course during the data collection period gave us permission to use their journals. However, the journals coded largely reflect what students say in the course and in presentations regarding their service-learning internships. The journal prompts also focused only on the service-learning internship, not the course as a whole. Thus, our data do not describe the benefits of the service-learning internship or the course independent of one another.
In conclusion, a seminar course with a service-learning internship focused on career exploration provides students with an opportunity to explore the world of work while expanding their understanding of KSAs within the workforce. Instructors and researchers should continue to investigate the multiple benefits that accrue to students who engage in career preparation courses and service-learning internships.
Footnotes
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The authors disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: This work was made possible by grants from St. Catherine University’s Community Work and Learning office as well as the Sister Annette Walters fund.