Service Learning: An Exciting Model for International Development Education

Sara Grusky

International service learning is an organized excursion taken by college students (and often faculty and administrators) to different countries or different cultures where students and faculty live with local families and "immerse" themselves in a culture that is distinct from their own.  Students work with local organizations to serve the community where they are staying, engage in a cultural exchange, and learn about a daily reality very different from their own.

These international programs are brimming over with unmet potential, especially in terms of addressing the vacuum in international development education.  This article will address both the potential and the pitfalls of these programs, identify some of the most common difficult issues (which are too often avoided but which can yield great opportunities for critical analysis and reflection) and examine the vision and contradictions that underlie these programs.

Untapped Potential

There is a huge knowledge gap in international development education that international service-learning programs can motivate faculty members to address.  Classroom lessons and discussions about theories of economic and political development, political participation and participatory democracy, the structure and activities of the IMF and the World Bank, sustainable development models, grassroots social movements and much more can all become more evident, real live issues if students travel to other countries.

Similarly, service-learning experiences often generate profound questions from students.  Why does such poverty and injustice occur?  While answers are rarely simple, service-learning creates an abundance of "teachable moments" and students who are highly motivated to seek the answers.  The challenge then is posed to educators to create a relevant curriculum that can build upon and respond to the potential learning space opened by service-learning experiences.

In many institutions, the development of service-learning programs opens important new lines of communication across disciplines, departments, and divisions.  It takes both students and faculty out of the classroom and into the world, and in the process opens new opportunities for field study, research and collaboration with global community partners.  Service-learning can challenge faculty and administrators to reflect on educational pedagogy and broaden, in concrete practice, the educational mission of the institution.

Multiple Goals

Built into any service-learning situation is an exciting and potentially explosive multiplicity of goals.  The multiplicity of goals is, in part, a result of the multiple groups involved in any service-learning undertaking-- the students, the faculty, in-country government or non-governmental organizations, sponsors or community partners, and the families and communities where the students are housed.  Moreover, there are always multiple and conflicting goals within as well as between these different groups.

The students, for example, may be attracted to a service-learning trip out of general yearnings for travel, adventure and romance, or perhaps altruistic sentiments, cultural curiosity, desires to improve language skills, broaden their world perspective, prepare for a career in foreign service or international development organizations, or any combination of these reasons.  Faculty members leading the student delegation may have a mix of research, travel and educational goals, and a range of knowledge, contacts or experience in the country being visited.  The ability of the faculty members to facilitate the process of integrating conceptual and experiential learning is critical to the success of the trip.

The communities, agencies and programs that are the sites of service-learning programs have their own array of objectives for participating.  They may hope that a service-learning exchange will heighten the visibility of their organization or program, bring a better image, more votes, a few more tourist dollars, a new network of contacts, the possibility of an exchange program with U.S. educational institutions, or perhaps donations to an important cause.  It is also possible that the communities or programs view an important objective of their participation as receiving a "service" from the university students involved, although it should not be assumed that this is the most important aspect of the "exchange" taking place.

Often, indeed, the real educational service being offered is by the community or program that exposes the student to social realities and organizational challenges that may be invisible in his/her daily life.  The fact that service-learning often means the community or agency is offering a student a service, not vice-versa, is not an argument against service-learning programs.  Recognizing this reality can help overcome arrogance, paternalism or simplistic ideas of charity.  It can also generate important new questions and challenges for university service-learning programs as they develop partnerships in the community.  University service-learning programs are being challenged to build longer term sustainable relationships with the communities and programs that serve as service-learning sites-- relationships that build in reciprocity, respond to community-identified concerns, and concretely address inequities in resources and opportunities.

How to Encourage Critical Analysis And Reflection

In addition to the fact that service-learning programs do not always achieve the reciprocal relationships they strive for, international programs also have a tendency to retreat from the harshest inequities of North-South relations.  Without thoughtful preparation, orientation, program development and the encouragement of study, critical analysis and reflection, the programs can easily become small theaters that recreate historic cultural misunderstandings and simplistic stereotypes and replay on a more intimate scale the huge disparities in income and opportunity that characterize North-South relations today.  Below are five common junctures that can provide important openings for critical analysis, study, and reflection.

Attitudes toward street urchins, beggars and street peddlers

The economic crises developing countries face in an increasingly unequal global playing field contribute to poverty, desperation, and a mass of street peddlers and beggars in most Latin American cities.

Students, unaware and unfamiliar with this situation, may react in a variety of ways.  They may feel harassed and irritated by the beggars and street peddlers constantly asking for money or showing their wares, or they may feel saddened and overwhelmed, particularly by the children in these situations.  Students often debate the merits of giving money; how much to give; for what it will be used.  All of these reactions are important openings for further discussion.  The question: "Why are so many people in this situation?" needs to be answered.  Student attitudes that simplistically blame individuals for their poverty need to be addressed.  Many ideas for further student research and investigation can be stimulated by discussion-- for example, further background study on the country's economic crisis, demystifying the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank and the impact of their policies, interviews with peddlers and street urchins.  Are the street peddlers organized?  Are there other organizations addressing their plight?  There are a thousand possibilities.  The only unacceptable one is to avert our eyes and leave the issue unaddressed.

Gender politics: The female student experience

The stereotype of the macho Latin American male has its counterpart in the stereotype of the "liberated" American female.  Historically, both U.S. and Latin American males have confused some form of authentic female liberation with sexual availability.  These stereotypes complicate the female student experience in Latin America.  Add to this potent clash of stereotypes the double standard that exists in both cultures (in similar and different shapes and forms) regarding acceptable behavior for males and acceptable behavior for females and you have a very explosive brew.  The North American female is highly sought after. She may also be disrespected or demeaned due to the misunderstanding of liberation and the double standard that pervades all male-dominated societies.  The increasing penetration of U.S. media can contribute to unfortunate cultural stereotypes about North American women.

All these issues are important to discuss.  The success of any intercultural exchange can be measured, in part, by its success in moving people beyond these common stereotypes.

Gender politics: The male student experience

The male and female student experiences have in common the possibility of being highly sought after by the opposite sex.  In this regard, North American students traveling abroad are in positions of unusual power.  How can this power be handled responsibly?

Beginning to answer that question requires a more in-depth examination of the reasons why North American students may be so highly sought after by Latin American young people.  We have discussed the female experience where media stereotypes of North American women as highly sexualized objects have contributed to unfortunate misunderstandings.  The attractiveness of U.S. students to Latin American young people may also be in response to highly constrained job and social opportunities within their own societies.  The dream of escaping to "the land of opportunity" by falling in love with the handsome or beautiful stranger is an old but still very powerful motif.  What may be an interesting encounter, a fun evening of drink and dancing, or a casual walk along the beach to a young U.S. student could be the beginning of many hopes, fantasies and dreams to a young Latin American man or woman aspiring to new horizons and economic and social opportunities beyond those his/her small town or struggling country can offer.  Given the unfortunate social attitudes that reward male behaviors of sexual conquest, male students are particularly at risk for engaging in exploitative behaviors in these situations.

While these are not easy topics to discuss, they are important to touch upon prior to the trip.  Students need to be sensitive to the possible dynamics in these situations and mature enough not to take advantage of socioeconomic inequities and cultural misunderstandings that may prevail.  In the course of the trip, concrete situations may provide ample opportunities for in-depth discussion and reflection on these issues.

Money matters: Food and entertainment

Service-learning immersion experiences are powerful because students have an opportunity to live daily lives shoulder to shoulder with Latin American families.  Latin American families also get intimate glimpses of U.S. students.  How should the students and their host families approach the fact that they are living in two different economies (the dollar economy vs. the local economy)?

One of the most common reports students make upon their return is that they unknowingly offended their hosts by having too much money to throw around by local standards.  Perhaps students decide to go out to dinner instead of eating at home with their families (spending as much as their host's daughter made that week).  Perhaps they decide to go to the local nightclub and invite young people in the community (not realizing that the entrance fee would be half their weekly salary).  Students often comment with delight on how cheap local food, craft items, and clothing are.

How should these situations be approached?  Should students avoid restaurants and nightclubs? Should they invite their host families along and make clear that they (the students) are paying the tab?  Would some families feel uncomfortable with this?  How much spending money should students bring?  While there are no simple answers to these questions, it is helpful if students arrive in the country having thought about these issues beforehand.  Their sensitivities will be heightened.  The daily dilemmas that come from these stark economic inequities are important topics for reflection, discussion, research and analysis.  These daily dilemmas can encourage students to further investigate the economic realities in the communities in which they live.

The superpower mentality internalized

Service-learning immersion programs are usually organized to provide ample time for discussion and cultural exchange between U.S. students and other school groups, social organizations, families and communities.  The Latin American or Caribbean participants in these cultural exchanges are often just as curious about U.S. life and society as the U.S. students are about the country they are visiting.  They also may have their own set of stereotypes or misconceptions about U.S. society such as that everyone is comfortably well off or there are minimal social problems.  U.S. students may be placed in the challenging position of needing to accurately represent the complexity of U.S. society and dispel some common stereotypes.

U.S. students, overwhelmed by the development challenges faced by the country they are visiting, may stumble upon their own arrogance during these cultural exchanges unless they have the benefit of some forethought or discussion.  Common mistakes include:

"We don't have these problems in our country."  This may or may not be true.  But certainly the U.S. faces mammoth social problems-- including having the highest percentage of the population incarcerated in the world and the manufacturing and marketing of most of the sophisticated weaponry in the world.  We clearly have some very profound social problems to address in our country.

"We can tell you how to solve your problems."  With the best of intentions, U.S. students can fall into the trap of thinking they can solve someone else's problems-- often without understanding the full complexity of the situation.

"Follow the path or model of the U.S. to solve your problems."  Because the United States is a world leader and a superpower, many students may assume that the U.S. is an appropriate and viable model for our countries to emulate.  Again, this may or may not be true.  But it certainly should not be assumed without careful examination of the situation.

Many students return from international service-learning trips overwhelmed by the economic deprivation they witnessed and frustrated by their inability to "really make a difference."  This discontent and searching on the part of U.S. students can bring them to a clearer understanding of the fundamental necessity for profound social change.  And this, in turn, contributes to a much more solid foundation for global understanding and global action than the original (well-meaning but simplistic) desire to serve.

Service-learning, whether it takes place across borders or across neighborhoods, most often brings together oppressed, marginalized, or "underprivileged" groups of people with more privileged and economically wealthy young students.  Thus service-learning can raise issues of cultural arrogance, racism, stereotypes, privilege and economic disparities, which must be discussed.

It is my hope that this article enriches the dialogue on efforts to improve reflection, analysis and study as a vital component of service-learning experiences and excites social science educators about the tremendous potential of service-learning programs to reinvigorate the educational process.  International development education, in particular, has much to gain from the growth of international service-learning programs.

Sara Grusky, Ph.D., has taught international development courses at various universities including Howard University, Catholic University, Trinity College and Gettysburg College.  At Gettysburg College she worked with the Center for Public Service and participated in the international service-learning program.  She is the former coordinator of the Debt and Development Project at Bread for the World Institute.

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