Service Learning & Social Justice: Best Friends or Bitter

Enemies
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Service Learning & Social

Justice: Best Friends or Bitter
Enemies
Rylan Wall & Kayla Kosaki
ACPA 2016

Agenda
1.

Introduction

2.

Context

3.

Analysis of literature (two major themes)

4.

Case Study

5.

Broad Recommendations

Who We Are
Kayla Kosaki (she/her/hers)

Rylan Wall (he/him/his)

Oregon State University CSSA Graduate Program

Oregon State University CSSA Graduate Program

Alternative Break & Staff Development GTA in Center

for Civic Engagement

Outreach & Campus Collaboration GTA in Center for

Civic Engagement

Born and raised in Hilo, Hawaii

Background work and research in queer and international

student populations

Currently working on research and practices focused on

supporting Pacific Islander identity in higher education

WORK
SPOUSES

Context
Background information that informed our perspectives and entry into the topic

Calls for Civic and Democratic Engagement

In 2007, the U.S. ranked

139 of 172
in voter participation of world
democracies

Call to reclaim and reinvest in civic and

democratic mission of higher ed,
advance frameworks for civic learning,
expand partnerships & alliances locally,
nationally, and globally

(A Crucible Moment: College Learning and Democracys Future)

Connections
Political
Advocacy

Service

Multicultural
Competenc
e

Civic
Engagement

Etc.

Four Pillars of Social Justice Infrastructure

Critique for how gay and lesbian activism has approached activism through a legal
civil right approach (Spade, 2015)
Nonprofit/charity/service framework often controlled by private entities, putting
restrictions on work; Non-profit industrial complex (Smith, 2009)
POLICY

Promote change in
institutions and
policies
Legislative and
legal strategies

CONSCIOUSNESS
Shift media
paradigm and alter
public opinion and
consciousness
Media advocacy,
education, and
independent media
work

SERVICE
Stabilize vulnerable
people and promote
survival
Provide food,
medical care, and
other crucial
support

POWER
Achieving
autonomous
community power
Developing
leadership, building
large scale
influence and
membership

Themes
Two major themes that we found in the literature

Reinforcing Systems of Oppression

Traditional service learning (Mitchell, 2008)

Pedagogy of whiteness (Mitchell, Donahue, & Young-Law, 2012)

Positions of inferiority (Davis, 2006; Schwartz, 2011)

De-politicizing of Service

Glorified welfare system (Robinson, 2000)

Individual responsibility (Westheimer & Kahne, 2004)

Mixed Measures (Kinzie, 2012; Prentice & Robinson, 2010)

Learning Tool for Social Justice

Meaningful Collaboration
Bringing together service and diversity as a vehicle to better explore and understand
the wide variation in the human experience (Roper, 2012)
Public health education: Purposeful stakeholder value in accomplishing intersecting
missions (Ottenritter, 2004)

Sensemaking (Mitchell, 2014)

Process that facilitates complex understanding and commitment to social justice;
Intentional design involving 6 key properties as a high impact practice

Critical service learning (Mitchell, 2008)

Social change orientation, working to redistribute power and develop authentic
relationships

Case Study

Professor hopes class is as transformative for his

students as ASB was in his college career

Centers border-crossing as key to the pedagogy,

gaining experience in an environment previously
unknown

Grand State University

Goals

Predominately white, large, public, research university

SOC 201H - Honors Fundamentals of Sociology

Offered once a year in the spring semester

Uses mix of service learning from ASB and class

readings, reflections, and discussions
Enrolls around 15 students

Prior to the trip, class curriculum focuses on

Student Reflections

This is why I treat everybody the same. Its

unfair that poverty exists, but it doesnt help if
we keep looking at our differences because that
s what causes discrimination in the first place.

I get that racism exists and that Latinos

sociological theory and team building then delves into

experience racism. But its just a matter of

Critical Race Theory and intersectionality at the end of

numbers and American jobs. We cant focus on

the term, once students are closer and more

race all the time when we obviously have our

comfortable speaking about tougher issues with each

other

own issues of poverty and homelessness to

worry about.

Alternative Spring Break (ASB)

All students required to go on the same ASB trip
focused on homelessness and poverty in a nearby

I have been struggling with feeling helpless as a

White person to make any difference. I feel like
this problem is so huge, but at least I made a

Our Application in the OSU Center for Civic

Engagement

Center for Civic Engagement

Focus on reciprocity and reflection, contextualize all of our days of service, activities, and the way
we structure building collaborative relationships with others

Alternative Break

Focus on Solidarity Over Charity, Intersectionality, and Social Change

Trip leader training, planning process, pre-trip meetings, daily reflections, and reorientation
post-spring break

Emphasis on meaningful collaboration, decolonized pedagogy, and importance of an

ongoing process on the micro and macro level

If you have come here to help me, you are wasting your time. But if you have come
because your liberation is bound up with mine, then let us work together.
- Aboriginal Activist Group, Queensland 1970s

Recommendations
For each theme

Caution with Service Learning

Audit your
service

Changing
the
language
Further
research

Recommendations

Example
The First-Year Experience at the College of New Jersey is a collaboration between General Education and
Student Life. Students live in residence hall communities with a volunteer non-resident faculty fellow for
each floor. Faculty fellows, student life staff, and students plan residence hall activities. Students also take an
interdisciplinary core course, Athens to New York, taught by full-time faculty and selected student life staff
in residence hall classrooms, and incorporating service-learning. Four questions drive the mission of the
First-Year Experience: What does it mean to be human? What does it mean to be a member of a community?
What does it mean to be moral, ethical, and just? and How do communities respond to differences? Servicelearning provides a compelling situation in which students can confront complex social issues, apply their
talents to marginalized communities, interact and work with diverse populations, and enhance their career
preparation.

Powerful Partnerships: A Shared Responsibility for Learning

Joint report from AAHE, ACPA, and NASPA

Transforming Service
Critical
service
learning

Collaborative
service

Further
research

Recommendations

Conclusion

Paradox Both are true

Institutions obligation to civic engagement also ties it to social justice

Service can be an important part of fostering social justice commitment

It is not enough to simply be an active or engaged citizen. Civic engagement and active
citizenship in a democracy should be a vehicle for pursuing democratic ideals of justice
and equality in a multicultural society (Einfeld & Collins, 2008, p. 105)

Questions? Contact Us!

Rylan Wall
Rylan.Wall@oregonstate.edu

Kayla Kosaki
Kayla.Kosaki@oregonstate.edu
If youd like a copy of todays slides and
a list of articles referenced, please leave
your business card with us!

Thank you for learning with us!

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