Service Learning: What's a Political Scientist Doing in Yonkers?

The Impact of Direct Involvement I and Direct Involvement II Experiences on Secondary School Students’ Social Capital, as Measured by Co-Cognitive Factors of the Operation Houndstooth Intervention Theory

“…As a result, he categorized Bridging Social Capital as more outward looking, generating broader ideas of reciprocity toward others, as opposed to bonding, which reinforced identities within homogeneous groups. Other researchers also noted the importance of bringing students into contact with dissimilar backgrounds and those in an obvious state of need as an important element in the development of civic engagement (Beamer, 1998; Boyte, 1991; Youniss & Yates, 1997). Students who participated in Key Club activities had frequent and sustained contact with community members from dissimilar groups, including special needs students, the elderly, and students living in poverty.…”

“…Researchers (Beamer, 1998; Boyte, 1991; Youniss & Yates, 1997) have noted the importance of bringing students into contact with those in an obvious state of need as an important element in the development of civic engagement. McLellan and Youniss (2003) found that students who participated in this type of service in contrast with functionary tasks (e.g., setting up for events, filing, sweeping, phoning for donations) were more likely to continue community service after graduation.…”

Linking Experiential and Classroom Education: Lessons Learned from The American University-Amnesty International USA Summer Institute on Human Rights

“…3 In the case of the SIHR, students become active in the wider global community. Service learning that is relevant to the subject being studied has been shown to improve students' understanding of concepts and the application of theory to practicẽ Markus, Howard, and King, 1993;Beamer, 1998;Corbett and Kendall, 1999!. This claim has been supported by an experiment that compared outcomes for students in service learning and non-service learning sections of a large undergraduate political science lecture course.…”

Teaching the Transnationalization of Politics: Participant Observation of Public Events

“…From our point of view, participant observation is a suitable method for acquiring sensual impressions of political processes (for a general discussion in political science, see Fenno , ; Schöne ; Behnke, Baur, and Behnke :247–269) . While its usefulness as a research method is increasingly acknowledged in political science (for example, Gillespie and Michelson ), it has also been implemented in specific course settings as a means of experiential learning (Beamer ; Silver and Perez ). We utilized participant observation as a teaching method through which the students in our course on transnationalization could acquire sensual impressions of how transnational dynamics shape domestic politics.…”