Service learning experiences: a way forward in teaching engineering students?

Abstract

Engineering education in the UK has slowly begun to understand the benefits of service learning, in which students take part in a community project as part of their course. The Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Sheffield has explored service learning for the past three years.

This paper looks at the use of service learning in an engineering environment in terms of embedding social awareness into the curriculum and looks at the issues surrounding the engagement of engineering students. It discusses problems which cause barriers to successful implementation as well as how service learning can inspire the next generation of engineers and change the perception of engineering in the community.

Introduction

Universities in the USA have seen an increase in the provision of service learning experiences since the early 1900s. Service learning has been defined as a credit-bearing learning experience in which students take part in a community or a social project whilst working to achieve some of the learning outcomes of their course (Bringle and Hatcher, 1996). Students involved in service learning courses are repeatedly reported to have benefited more than students not involved in this type of learning. They have also reported an increase in engagement with their courses in terms of being able to apply their skills in new situations and an enhanced sense of social responsibility (Marcus et al., 1993; Cohen et al., 1994). Service learning is not community service; the essential element is that activity is framed within a learning environment (Stanton, 1990). This type of learning is certainly not widespread practice in UK HEIs, including engineering. However, experiential learning (often based around solving a known engineering problem and with industrial involvement) has gained much ground in recent years (Dutson et al., 1997). Service learning is a ‘balanced approach to experiential learning’ (Furco, 1996). Stukas et al. (1999) asked the question, ’service-learning: who benefits and why?’ They identified three main potential ‘beneficiaries’ of this type of learning: the student, the institution and the community. However, they also argued that none of the potential benefits offered by service learning (learning enhancement, citizenship, fulfilment, employability, reputation, positive impact on the community, etc.) are guaranteed and, therefore, more research is needed to best determine the factors required to achieve the goals and satisfaction of all stakeholders.

Background

Over the years, service learning has repeatedly appeared in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Sheffield through group design projects, student dissertations and research projects. However, it was an ad hoc practice that, whilst helping to develop links with the community and expertise within the department, had not been fully established. It was not until 2007 that service learning was consciously implemented in one particular course as a learning approach used to enhance the student learning experience.

As part of their engineering degree within the Department, students have the option of developing a broad range of skills, including entrepreneurial and business skills. The capstone project entitled Technology Strategy and Business Planning runs in the final year of the four year MEng degree and has grown from the original Enterprise module’ (see Table 1).

Essential to the module is the concept that the students work in teams to find solutions to a real problem provided by a real customer. The challenge is for the student teams to identify a technical solution to the customer’s problem and then go on to develop a business proposition.

The module is worth ten credits, equivalent to a hundred hours of work per student. Students have one two-hour contact-time session each week during the first eight weeks of the semester and then use the remaining four weeks to develop their ideas and business propositions. During this period students have support from business and technical mentors. Only 15% of the module is delivered by the module leader. For the remaining time students are supported by external contributors from a great range of disciplines, including business angels, bankers, marketers, business advisors, manufacturers, etc. Table 2 shows an example of the content the module provides and the variety of contributors and mentors.

Table 1 Evolution of Level 4 module: first phase (Handscombe, 2010)

Year	Students taking module	Module description	Specific details	Module leader reflection
1	28	A module on commercial exploitation, challenging student groups to devise new commercial applications for a piece of mature university research.		No emotional attachment. No technical problem to focus on - emphasis on business venturing. No external dimension.
2	43	Merger of the above module with Technology Strategy to create a new Business Planning module where a commercial problem was identified and student teams devised new companies to overcome it.	A representative of Tesco outlined the problem they have with costs and customer complaints regarding wine tainting through corkage. This was a real technical challenge to devise something different from what currently exists.	Good technical challenge. Good external interaction from Tesco setting the problem and assessment by a team of external mentors.
3	51	As above, but with the identified problem having a social element.	A representative of a packaging association outlined the challenges of child proof but easy to use packaging.	Again a real technical challenge, the opportunity for licensable intellectual property and a strong sense that the work was ‘worthwhile’.
4	55	Focus this year was on a company’s major business problem.	A local company identified its overall business problem and asked for new product ideas.	Very little emotional commitment - an unknown company has problems making a profit. No clear technical problem to focus on.

Table 2 Example of module timetable (2009)

Topic	Type of delivery	Speaker	Position held	Company	Date
1. Writing your business plan Design for living	Lecture Lecture	Elena Rodriguez-Falcon AI aster Yoxall	Senior University Teacher Lecturer	The University of Sheffield SHU	Feb 11
2. IPR Understanding the customer	Lecture Lecture	Douglas Drysdale Louise Hitchings	European Patent Attorney Marketing Executive	Murgitroyd Outokumpu Stainless	Feb 18
3. The challenge	CUSTOMERS	Staff members Patient and Wife	Various	St Luke’s Hospice	Feb 25
4. Business models	Lecture	Peter Crawford	Solicitor	Taylor & Emmet	Mar 4
5. Finance sources	Discussion panel	Emma L Turner Martin Manning	Business Manager Business Angel	HSBC YABA	Mar 11
6. Financial statements	Lecture	SIFE representative	Calum Moore	SIFE Ltd	Mar 18
7. I have done it!	Discussion panel	Will Christopher Paul Thomas	Entrepreneur	Will Yaki Mycorrhizal Syst Ltd	Mar 25
8. What makes a good business plan. Elevator pitches	Lecture Lecture	Richard Campos Elena Rodriguez-Falcon	Managing Director Senior University Teacher	RC Business Support Limited The University of Sheffield	Apr 1
Mentorship scheme (technical and business)
Business mentorship: by appointment only!	Advice	Amy Jones (Mech Eng), Liz Gillot (BE SY), Jenny Moore and Toni Cook (Enterprise at Sheffield), Emily Savage, Helen Parrott (WRCETLE)	Email for an appointment or for advice
Technical mentorship	Surgery	Nigel Harrison	Director	KingKraft	April 29
ASSESSMENT (Submission deadlines and poster presentation date)
Business plan (50%) Individual effort factor	Assessment	Elena Rodriguez-Falcon	Tutor	The University of Sheffield	May 8
• Poster presentation (40%)	Assessment	Customer, academics and business people	Various	Various	May 21

At the end of the course, teams pitch their ideas to an invited audience and defend the poster presentation of their business idea in front of judges from a mixed background (technical, commercial and legal). Prizes are then awarded for the best presentations. The objective of the module is to give the student the opportunity to try to solve a real problem by combining their engineering knowledge with the commercial constraints that would be met in making a business success of their technical solution. It is also an opportunity for students to develop their presentational skills, both oral and poster.

The move to service learning

Over the years, this business planning module has evolved from the exploitation of the department’s research, through working with external clients on real problems mainly in the area of product development, to finally working with the community (Handscombe et al., 2008). Originally, the module was centred on the development of a business plan for a piece of research undertaken in the Department, an example being a polarising camera for analysing photo-elastic stress analysis results. Reflection on the module practice and learning outcomes, based on feedback provided by students, showed little engagement with the problem and a poor learning experience.

It was then decided to move the learning approach from the direct ‘here is an artefact, write a business plan’ to an experiential learning activity based around solving a real problem; the aim was to develop increased student engagement, employability skills and meet the module’s learning outcomes. Feedback on the module during the subsequent three years showed that the approach of setting a real-world problem to which the students had to provide a solution as well as develop a business case enhanced the learning experience. The initial project chosen was based around the development of a new cap or closure for wine bottles. The following year, when the module was based on another packaging project, the students produced not only high-quality business plans but also technology that was seen as worthwhile intellectual property and generated student driven knowledge transfer into other research areas.

However, all this came crashing down the following year when the project chosen, although a real-world problem, failed to enthuse the students and create worthwhile outcomes across the board. The main problem identified by the students was the lack of engagement of the ‘client’ and that the focus of the project was more on ‘helping the customer make a profit’ than having the opportunity to use their technical skills and solve the problem. Hence, a better and more cohesive approach was needed to produce a stable learning environment. A reflection on the learning outcomes for these years is included in Table 1.

It was therefore apparent that a new and robust methodology was needed in order to avoid low student engagement and poor learning outcomes. Based on ad hoc service learning experiences within the Department and the work conducted on research led teaching, coupled with the desire to reach out to the broader community, a service learning and teaching framework was developed with social enterprise at its core.

Methodology

The aim was to move away from the direct technical solution of a single commercial problem. More emphasis was placed on the social need for a business solution. This change came about following observation of a research led teaching project that had previously been run in the Department, based on work with a young boy called Kieron who had severe cerebral palsy. The student leading the project had shown a great deal of interest in ensuring that the outcomes of the project were exceptional. This student explained that making an impact on the young child would be the best outcome of his dissertation. The ‘unusual’ engagement of this student with his project helped the authors of this paper develop some hypotheses about using the same approach with large classes. Previous experience had shown that, whilst this social context was nothing new, for it to work effectively it had to be set within a formal framework. The first step was to look at social enterprise within an experiential engineering education framework. This led eventually to the authors looking at practice within the service learning framework.

Experiential learningand social enterprise

Experiential learning is a continuous process, grounded in experience, where learning is developed through adaptation and problem solving activity (Kolb, 1993). Within this context, the first notion in enterprise learning is the significance of ‘action’: an orientation towards it and experience derived through it. Action can be split into three parts: the ‘act of doing’; the ‘experience gained in the doing’; and the ‘learning accumulated from the experience’ (Pittaway et al., 2007). It is well accepted that enterprising students engage better in practice through hands-on learning activities or the ‘act of doing’ (Dalley and Hamilton, 2000; Rae, 2000; Rae and Carswell, 2000; Jones, 2009). It is also an accepted view that engineering students’ preferred learning styles fall within the same remit (Felder and Silverman, 1998) and, when those engaged in the experience reflect on what they have found, that learning tends to be more valuable when absorbed during experience (Kolb, 1984; Revans, 1982; DeFillipi, 2001). Kolb (1993) suggests that within this form of learning the student changes role from actor to observer and from specific involvement to general analytic detachment. It is during this analytic detachment where sufficient self reflection and critical self-evaluation enables students to develop valid knowledge that goes beyond excitement and vain interest in the subject (Barnett, 1990). Therefore, it is critical that students should be presented with different and competing traditions in order to facilitate critical creation as well as critical discovery (Mendus, 1992).

The service learning format

Having taken all of the above into consideration and curious about the unusual engagement that the student working with Kieron had shown, the authors explored an extension of experiential/social enterprise learning: service learning. As explained earlier, service learning is an assessed learning experience in which students take part in a community or social project whilst meeting the course objectives (Bringle and Hatcher, 1996).

Kathleen Mass Weigert (1998), in her book chapter Academic service learning: its meaning and relevance, lists six elements of academic service learning, which became the basis for the new module’s format:

1. The student provides meaningful service

2. The service that student provides meets a need or goal of some kind

3. Members of a community define the need

4. The service provided by the student flows from course objectives

5. Service is integrated into the course by means of an assignment(s) that requires some form of reflection on the service in light of course objectives

6. Assignments rooted in the service must be assessed and evaluated accordingly.

Consequently, these new modules were to have:

• A strong social element

• Clear interaction between students and customer to define the need

• Interaction with the wider community

• Clear understanding of professional and civic responsibilities and consideration of ethical issues

• Opportunity for social enterprise

• Reflection on learning outcomes and social impact (both students and staff)

• Dissemination of practice in order to move from the ad hoc approach.

Figure 1 Students meeting Kieron and his family

Figure 2 St Luke’s patient with winning students at poster presentation

All of these considerations were deep-seated in the module’s learning outcomes and assessment of the students. Assessment remained the same as before, however, an element of reflection was added to ensure that the experiential/service learning approach was completed.

The service learning years

Kieron’s Challenge was the first of these new module formats. In this challenge the brief was quite simple: to make his life easier. The solutions devised by the students were driven by the needs and wants of this seven year old boy, his family and carers. Further, the ideas generated, backed up by sponsorship from other local companies, had the potential to be developed into real commercial enterprises. Hence there were significant ‘pushes’ and ‘pulls’ for the students to engage with the project. Central to this was meeting and interacting with Kieron and his family, as can be seen in Figure 1.

The following year the project was based around the wants and needs of the Sheffield Children’s Hospital and its patients, and in 2009 students were faced with yet another social challenge: improving the quality of life of terminally ill patients at the local hospice. Figure 2 shows the winning team discussing their solution with a hospice patient. In both of these years students were again heavily engaged with users and their problems and some solutions were generated and prototyped. A summary of the projects and reflections of these are shown in Table 3.

For 2010, the project has been set up and will focus on enabling a better learning experience for children with learning difficulties and disabilities at a specialist local school. Although, the course is yet to be delivered, registration records show a record number of 144 students who will be taking the course.

Framework evaluation and analysis

The service learning framework has now been running for three years and sufficient data has been gathered to allow a meaningful evaluation and analysis of its impact on the student learning experience. The study sought to explore whether student engagement and attainment had been impacted in any way after introducing the service learning approach. This was achieved by conducting a questionnaire at the end of the module, through the analysis of non-requested feedback and by comparing students’ attainment before and after service learning was implemented. Key findings from the questionnaire are summarised in Table 4.

The methodology applied does have some weaknesses. For example, the questionnaire response rate each year was about 50-60% and the evidence collected and used depends on self reported learning and, as a consequence, the data do rely on the students’ own impressions of their learning experience. Consequently, a second part of this analysis was conducted by gathering data on other impact measures such as number of students registered each year and number of contributors engaging with the module, etc. Table 5 provides a summary of these impact measures.

Discussion

Whilst Table 4 presents a fairly conclusive picture that service learning appears to give improvements across all the criteria assessed, it is also clear that, when it comes to assessment and perceived learning, improvements are less significant. However, when analysing the module’s results it can be observed that during the past three years the marks have increased, on average, by a factor of 5%.

Table 3 Evolution of Level 4 module: second phase

Year	Number of students taking module	Module description	Specific details	Module leader reflection
5	70	Focus on a specific need of a specific individual.	A boy with cerebral palsy is interviewed by the whole class and outlines what he can do and what he would like to do.	Huge emotional commitment to find technical solutions to the boy’s problems and limitations. Ideas worked up well technically, and prototypes are being manufactured, but focus moved to technical aspects of product development and away from new venture development.
6	87	Focus on supporting a local children’s hospital	A representative for the children’s hospital and a patient are interviewed by the whole class and outline the problems in the occupational therapy and rehabilitation department.	As above, huge emotional commitment to find technical solutions to the children’s problems and limitations. Ideas worked up well technically and prototypes are being manufactured. Students from the course volunteered to solve other problems.
7	97	Focus on supporting a local hospice	A representative of the hospice and a patient are interviewed by the whole class and outline the problems faced by the hospice in providing care for their patients.	As above, huge emotional commitment to find technical solutions to the children’s problems and limitations. Ideas worked up well technically and further research is being conducted.
8	144	Focus on supporting a local school for children with special needs	No data available yet.	No data available yet.

It can also be seen that the nature of the project has also played an important role in enhancing overall student engagement and satisfaction. That said, students’ motivations for taking this module vary significantly at the start of the course: reasons are evenly split between ‘developing business skills’, ‘increasing employability skills’, ‘because of the project’ and ‘because it is coursework’!

It is, however, not uncommon to receive non-requested feedback by the end of the course, such as:

I enjoyed the course very much and I am glad I decided to opt for this module. It gave me a great understanding about business planning but above all, helping others to lead a better life with our innovations and designs.

This is my best module so far.

The question about personal outcomes is specifically phrased as ‘how much do you think the experience of participating in this project will positively affect your professional prospects?’ This particular question has been included from the beginning to evaluate the students’ perceptions of their employability skills as a consequence of the module. Results show that students tend to expect positive outcomes from having taken part in this type of project.

Although an investigation of how this module has actually affected students’ employability prospects has not been carried out, there is limited evidence (two students per year on average) in the form of non-requested feedback. An example of this is shown below - within a few months of the module concluding a student emailed:

I just wanted to let you know that I was successful in my job interview. It was incredible; most of the interview was focused on the Sheffield Children’s Hospital Challenge! Thank you so much for ensuring that we have such type of project, otherwise I might have not got the job!

Table 4 Key findings from the questionnaire

High satisfaction level: (%)	Pure experiential learning	Service learning
2004	2005	2006	2007	2008	2009
Module in general	74	78	62	89	87	87
Project	75	77	45	92	89	93
Assessment	76	75	70	78	77	80
Perceived learning achieved	70	72	68	77	78	79
Professional outcomes	65	63	25	77	76	77

The second part of the analysis is based on several impact measures (see Table 5). The number of students opting to take the module has doubled since 2004 and more than trebled since 2003. Similarly, contributors involved in the course such as bankers, marketers, lawyers etc have increased significantly over the years. Making a difference, contributing to people’s well-being and to the community and ‘doing good’ are all desirable traits that continue to remain part of the human condition (Mass Weigert, 1998).

Sponsorship for prizes showed a 300% increase in the year of the Kieron’s challenge. This can arguably be attributed to the fact that the organisations involved saw this as an opportunity to gain some press attention, something which suddenly seemed to appear out of nowhere and has remained consistent during the following years.

Other impact measures that can be analysed include teaching awards and grants received by the module tutor as a consequence of this learning approach. This evidences the interest that the academic and industrial community is increasingly showing in this type of learning approach.

The last impact measure, and perhaps the most important, is the level of student engagement with the customers. Customers have an interview with the whole group of students at the beginning of the module. During this interview students ask questions in order to determine the customer’s needs and the criteria they need to meet in order to demonstrate that they have achieved this goal at the end. In other learning settings, students typically engage with external speakers by asking questions and engaging in conversations with them. This, however, tends to be short interactions of between 10 to 20 minutes. As can be seen in Table 5, interviews in this learning setting, which are recorded and timed, have lasted up to four times longer in the last three years. Witnessing this type of interaction, where students use their technical skills to understand the problems, professionally and ethically approach any sensitive issues, but most of all, listen carefully to the community engaging with them, is one of the most rewarding experiences for any learning facilitator. In 2007 and 2008, several students from the group also offered their volunteering services to conduct other projects outside their learning environment. Lastly, during the two years and also for 2010, projects have been offered to the Department by community sectors looking to engage with the University and benefit from its help.

Conclusions

In 1999, Stukas et al. asked the question ’service learning: who benefits and why?’ They indicated that there are three main potential ‘beneficiaries’ of this type of learning: the student, the institution and the community. However, they also argued that none of the potential benefits offered by service learning (learning enhancement, citizenship, fulfilment, employability, reputation, positive impact in the community etc) is guaranteed and, therefore, more research was needed to best determine the factors necessary to achieving the goals and the satisfaction of all.

This paper asks the question: is service learning a way forward for teaching engineering students? Notwithstanding Stukas et al.’s arguments, the authors of this paper conclude that service learning has proved to be a definite improvement on previous learning approaches. Although there are barriers to embedding this type of learning method (such as organisational issues, learning agreements, deliverables and ethical considerations) the benefits to the three main stakeholders in this process observed during the past three years have been considerable:

• The student: increased satisfaction, engagement and possible increased employability.

• The institution: increased level of engagement with the community, external contributors and recognition through media attention and awards.

• The community: engagement with the University, problems tackled and some solutions developed. Increased sense of receiving help and also of helping the student learning experience.

Table 5 Impact measures

	Pure experiential learning	Service learning
2004	2005	2006	2007	2008	2009
Student numbers	43	51	55	70	87	97
Student interview with clients (time in minutes)	25	30	25	80	80	85
Number of contributors	3	4	5	8	15	17
Sponsorship for prizes	150	250	250	1000	750	750
Products prototyped				1	1	Ongoing (2)
Media interest				Yorkshire Post, Sheffield Star and BBC website. Interview with BBC Look North.	Yorkshire Post, Sheffield Telegraph. Interview with BBC Radio Sheffield.	Yorkshire Post (2), Sheffield Star.
Extra-curricular projects				1	1
Teaching awards and grants				RAEng, Teaching Award, ¬10,000	RAEng, ExxonMobil Teaching Award, ¬10,000	TUOS, BiC grant ¬10,000.
Non-requested project					X	X

On this last point, the authors would like to conclude with a non-requested email from a member of staff of the local hospice who, after the module had finished, contacted the department with the sad news of the death of the patient who had contributed to the course who, for the purpose of this paper, will be named George, and his wife, Esther.

Just to let you know that George died last Wednesday. Unfortunately, over the last few weeks George had become increasingly muddled and Esther was unable to manage him at home. After a long stay in St Lukes, George died in a nursing home. It was George’s funeral yesterday and Esther wanted everyone to know about George taking part in the University project and how much this meant to both of them particularly coming to the University and answering the student’s questions. Esther could not quite believe they had wanted to know about her as well!

Esther was happy for me to let you know about George and I wanted you to know how much they both valued taking part in the project and the memory you left Esther of that time.