Leveraging experiential learning to increase undergraduate students’ advocacy skills and political efficacy

ABSTRACT

Experiential learning is an approach to teaching that emphasizes hands-on experiences that provide students with an opportunity to synthesize the concepts and theories they have learned in a natural and meaningful way, which can deepen their knowledge, self-efficacy, and skill acquisition. We developed a unique strategic communication capstone course to refine communication-based skills in the context of an advocacy campaign that focused on activities related to political participation, a form of civic participation and engagement. Over the course of a 15-week semester, students identified an issue they would like to change, researched the issue, investigated members of the legislature and their positions, and developed supporting material, which culminated in a trip to present their ideas to state- and federal-level legislators. Fifty-one undergraduate students completed a written 15-minute survey that included structured and open-ended questions before and after their participation in the course. Participants showed increased confidence in skills related to political advocacy and increased political efficacy, which has the potential to increase future political engagement and participation. Open-ended questions revealed that many students felt more empowered to interact with elected officials, gained positive perceptions about the political process and players, and felt that they could create change.

KEYWORDS:

• Experiential learning
• advocacy
• communication
• higher education
• political behavior

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Ethics approval and consent

The study was approved by the Institutional Review Board of High Point University (Protocol 201,812–764), and participants provided written consent to participate.

Availability of data and materials

The data are not publicly available because of institutional review board (IRB) restrictions on the dissemination of student data. The datasets analyzed in the current study will be made available upon reasonable request to the corresponding author and upon completion of a data-use agreement. The data-use agreement requires that the data be used only for research purposes, that no attempts be made to identify individual participants, that the data will be kept secure, that the user will not distribute the data to other researchers, that the user will return the files or destroy them once the project is completed, and that the user will acknowledge the data source.

Supplementary material

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed online at https://doi.org/10.1080/21689725.2024.2341615

Notes

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Additional information

Funding

This study did not receive any specific grants from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.