Service Learning and Commitment to Community: Exploring the Implications of Honors Students' Perceptions of the Process 2 Years Later

Abstract

This article discusses an investigation involving 13 students who enrolled in a senior honors seminar designed as a service-learning course. The purpose was to explore how the participants perceived the course and their role in the community 2 years later. In keeping with the grounded theory techniques used to analyze the data, the study focused on discovering a grounded substantive theory (Glaser & Strauss, 1967) that described the processes involved in service learning for this particular group rather than on measuring outcomes. Using this approach led to the realization that there is a discrepancy between how many educators and researchers have conceptualized service and how participants in this study perceive their commitment to community 2 years after completing a service-learning course. Elements related to this new orientation that merit further exploration include the types and extent of commitment to community, participants' perceptions of the social context for their commitment to community, and variables other than the service-learning experience, such as background, fit, and current life circumstances that may influence the way service learning affects participants' commitment to community. These elements may have consequences for service-learning design, evaluation, and further research.

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