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Diverse Pedagogical Approaches To Experiential Learning: Multidisciplinary Case Studies, Reflections, and Strategies 1st Ed. Edition Karen Lovett
Diverse Pedagogical Approaches To Experiential Learning: Multidisciplinary Case Studies, Reflections, and Strategies 1st Ed. Edition Karen Lovett
Diverse Pedagogical Approaches To Experiential Learning: Multidisciplinary Case Studies, Reflections, and Strategies 1st Ed. Edition Karen Lovett
Edited by
Karen Lovett
Diverse Pedagogical Approaches
to Experiential Learning
Karen Lovett
Editor
Diverse Pedagogical
Approaches
to Experiential
Learning
Multidisciplinary Case Studies, Reflections,
and Strategies
Editor
Karen Lovett
Office of Experiential Learning
University of Dayton
Dayton, OH, USA
© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer
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Telling the Story
of Experiential Learning (EL)---Student
Perspectives on EL at UD
v
vi TELLING THE STORY OF EXPERIENTIAL LEARNING (EL)—STUDENT …
Note
1. The EL Lab has been a critical part of our work in the Office of Experi-
ential Learning; through these unique monthly three-hour workshops, we
promote EL to our peers and guide them through meaningful reflection
about their learning journeys using digital storytelling and other techniques.
Their reflection has included sharing their experiences abroad, community-
engaged learning opportunities on and off campus, as well as professional
development through various internships. For more information about the
EL Lab, visit udayton.edu/el.
Colleen Kelch, B.A. is originally from Chicago, Illinois. She graduated from
the University of Dayton with a B.A. in Communication, with a focus in Public
Relations, and a minor in English. While working in the Office of Experiential
Learning at UD, she created and managed social media accounts and collaborated
with her team members to produce informative and interesting digital content.
ix
x ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
xi
xii CONTENTS
Index 267
Notes on Contributors
xv
xvi NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS
substance abuse. She currently serves on the Board for the National
Alliance on Mental Illness (Montgomery County, Ohio).
Kelly Bohrer, M.S. is the Director of Community Relations for the
School of Engineering at the University of Dayton. In this role, she
provides leadership for the development, implementation, support, and
evaluation of community-engaged learning and scholarship initiatives that
advance the School’s academic and civic engagement mission. Kelly also
teaches upper-level community-engaged learning courses and is actively
involved in planning and implementing faculty and staff professional
development to promote and enhance community-based experiential
learning. Other positions Kelly has held at the University of Dayton
include the Director of Community Engaged Learning and Scholarship
within the Fitz Center for Leadership in Community, Coordinator of
Community Outreach in the Center for Social Concern, and the Lab
Coordinator in the Biology Department. In these roles, she created,
directed, implemented, and assessed high-impact experiential learning
and civic engagement initiatives, including social justice education, local
immersions, and inquiry-based science labs.
Dr. Lisa J. Borello has served as the Director of the Women’s Center
at the University of Dayton since July 2017. In this role, Dr. Borello
advances gender equity on campus via educational programming,
research, and policy development. She also serves as Adjunct Faculty in
the Department of Sociology, Anthropology and Social Work at UD.
Prior to joining UD, Dr. Borello served as the Assistant Director in the
Professional Development and Career Office at Johns Hopkins Univer-
sity in Baltimore, Maryland. She’s spent more than 15 years working in
higher education in diverse roles ranging from strategic communications
to grant writing to managing a research lab. She has a Ph.D. and M.S.
from Georgia Tech in Sociology of Science & Technology, a Master’s in
Women’s Studies from Georgia State University, and received her Bache-
lor’s degree in Journalism and Women’s Studies from Penn State Univer-
sity. She conducts research on women’s advancement in higher educa-
tion, gender, and technologies of the body and women in male-dominated
STEM professions.
Malcolm W. Daniels, Ph.D. is a faculty member in the Department of
Electrical and Computer Engineering. With undergraduate and grad-
uate degrees from the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow, Scotland,
NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS xvii
xxv
List of Tables
Table 4.1 Various locations visited during GEO 204 field trips 49
Table 15.1 CSI learning outcome 229
Table 16.1 Average Scores on 3 Dimensions of Intercultural
Effectiveness for SAIL Cohort 1 (2016–2017) 248
Table 16.2 Average Scores on 3 Dimensions of Intercultural
Effectiveness for SAIL Cohort 2 (2017–2018) 248
Table 16.3 Average Scores on 3 Dimensions of Intercultural
Effectiveness for Control Group 2 (2016–2017) 249
Table 16.4 Average Scores on 3 Dimensions of Intercultural
Effectiveness for SAIL Cohort 3 (2018–2019) 249
Table 16.5 Average Scores on 3 Dimensions of Intercultural
Effectiveness for Control Group 3 (2018–2019) 249
xxvii
CHAPTER 1
Karen Lovett
The field of experiential learning (EL) has significantly expanded over the
past several decades, along with a proliferation of research and scholar-
ship on EL methods and best practices. The following chapters provide
detailed, behind-the-scenes insights into the creation and development of
powerful and impactful EL programs that contribute to student success.
The book brings together the voices of 37 faculty, staff, undergraduate
and graduate students, alumni, and community partners, from over fifteen
different academic disciplines and areas of specialization at the University
of Dayton (UD), a private Catholic and Marianist institution in Dayton,
Ohio. The book contains EL case studies, reflections, and strategies for
designing, facilitating, expanding, and assessing different EL activities and
programs, including community-engaged learning, internships, education
abroad, student employment, and more. It provides a unique, holistic pic-
ture of EL which includes educators’ personal experiences and learning
processes—perspectives which are often missing in EL literature.
K. Lovett (B)
Director of Experiential Learning, University of Dayton, Dayton, OH, USA
e-mail: klovett1@udayton.edu
The book also features many examples of the ways EL educators collab-
orate within and across academic and professional boundaries to develop
multidisciplinary, interdisciplinary, and transdisciplinary approaches to
EL. The chapters describe the complexities of doing EL in a college set-
ting, including: integrating EL into a course or curriculum, navigating
academic and institutional hurdles to obtain EL resources and support,
handling the logistics of executing an EL activity or program, mentor-
ing and guiding students with varied skills and abilities who are at dif-
ferent developmental stages in their college careers, leading students into
new and diverse communities beyond the classroom, and facilitating deep,
sometimes difficult conversations with students and colleagues about the
ethical, social, political, and economic dimensions of EL.
One especially unique feature of this book is that students contributed
to the collection in many important ways. Students in ENG 377 Writ-
ing in Social Contexts, taught by English professor Patrick Thomas,
co-authored the afterword and provided immensely valuable editorial
support, rendering the book itself an EL project. Additionally, my own
student team in the Office of Experiential Learning co-authored the
book’s foreword and offered a wealth of insights that informed the
development of this project.
Scholars have offered numerous definitions for EL, a broad term which
includes many pedagogical approaches, learning environments, and activ-
ities1 (Beard & Wilson, 2015; Eyler, 2009; McClellan & Hyle, 2012;
Morris, 2016). In sum, EL is a process that involves active engagement
and self-guided learning in a purposeful, immersive experience, as well as
reflection and sense-making about that experience in order to transform
it into knowledge that can be applied in subsequent experiences and con-
texts. Active engagement in purposeful, immersive experiences can take
many forms, from internships to community-engaged learning, student
employment, education abroad, and more—there are numerous teaching
and learning methods which can be included under the larger umbrella
of EL (Roberts, 2016).
EL learning goals and objectives can also vary greatly; some experi-
ences are intended to prepare students for specific professions, others
are meant to help individuals achieve greater integration of classroom
concepts and real-world problems, others are meant to enhance learners’
problem-solving and leadership skills or intercultural competencies, and
some attempt to do all of these and even more. In addition to differences
in form and objectives, strategies for implementing EL experiences can
1 INTRODUCTION: LISTENING AND LEARNING FROM EXPERIENTIAL … 3
efforts and help foster communities of practice around EL. The deep sup-
port and commitment to EL allow educators to experiment with different
types of EL and establish important partnerships across institutional and
community boundaries. This has resulted in fruitful and vibrant EL
communities of practice which include individuals from a myriad of
backgrounds, perspectives, and types of expertise. I am very fortunate to
be the Director of EL at a university where EL is widely practiced and
supported by university leadership, and where students generally have
great interest in, and access to, a multitude of EL opportunities. And, of
course, it is wonderful to be at a place where there is so much interest in
reflection, research, and scholarship about EL.
The city of Dayton also provides a unique context for this collection.
Despite Dayton’s historical legacy as a city of inventors and successful
business owners, it has also faced many difficulties such as an economic
depression, the ongoing opioid epidemic, a struggling public education
system, housing and racial segregation, food deserts, among others. These
issues are not unique to Dayton and can be seen in cities across the
Midwest and US. UD communities have responded to these local and
regional issues through a number of EL programs, while also educating
students about community assets and opportunities. Dayton is experienc-
ing an economic revitalization, and its population is gradually increasing
and becoming more diverse and welcoming to newcomers such as immi-
grants and refugees. Readers of this text will gain important insight into
the ways EL educators in this book are applying their expertise, knowl-
edge, and skills in new ways to address these realities so their students
have the best chance of becoming the kinds of responsive, creative, and
collaborative problem-solvers the world needs.
This collection can appeal to a range of audiences, including faculty
and staff educators looking for examples of EL within and across disci-
plines, as well as college administrators interested in supporting faculty
in their areas and gaining a better understanding of the issues educa-
tors encounter when doing EL. Those who are interested in expanding
campus-wide EL initiatives and advancing EL goals, nurturing communi-
ties of practice around EL, and developing an understanding of faculty at
different stages of learning around EL would find the collection helpful
as well. Students interested in how learning happens in diverse social con-
texts, or those looking to explore the institutional demands, constraints,
and opportunities that impact EL in higher education would also benefit
from this book. The sections described below offer readers a roadmap for
6 K. LOVETT
exploring six key themes in the collection. These themes are applicable to
many forms of EL as well as diverse student populations and institutions
involved in EL.
Crossing Boundaries:
Transdisciplinary EL for Social Justice
Chapter 8, “We Are All Students: the Moral Courage Project as a Model
for Transdisciplinary Experiential Learning” by Joel Pruce, Ph.D., and
Natalie Hudson, Ph.D., describes the development and growth of a multi-
sited (Ferguson, Missouri, and El Paso) inter-/transdisciplinary EL pro-
gram focused on human rights, which involves collaboration among fac-
ulty and community partners from photography, political science, media
production, and more. Chapter 9, “Dinner in the Desert Kitchen: Reflec-
tions on Experiential Learning through Food, Art, and Social Practice” by
Glenna Jennings, M.F.A., explores a socially engaged art program involv-
ing educators, students, advocates, and food-related organizations who
work to raise awareness of food justice and food insecurity in Dayton.
The chapter addresses key challenges and successes in establishing col-
laborations across academic disciplines, managing course assessment, and
sustaining equitable partnerships with individuals and organizations out-
side the university.
Conclusion
As Director of Experiential Learning at UD, I have developed a great
appreciation for the fascinating, complex, and innovative EL landscape
around me, which is reflected in the following chapters. My unique per-
spective as an anthropologist of education has informed the ways in which
I examine and analyze EL in its numerous forms and expressions. I have
been guided by a desire to discover the meaning, value, and impact of EL,
from the perspectives of those who participate in EL and practice it every
day. Through hundreds of illuminating conversations about EL with fac-
ulty, staff, students, alumni, and community partners, my understanding
of the multifaceted nature of EL deepened and expanded. I have also
gained insight into how these individuals are actively re-shaping institu-
tional norms and transforming cultures of higher education as they work
10 K. LOVETT
Notes
1. For a compilation of various EL definitions, see Beard and Wilson (2015,
pp. 25–26).
2. For more information, see our EL catalog at udayton.edu/el.
3. For more information about the Office of Experiential Learning archive of
EL interviews, reflections, and testimonies, visit udayton.edu/el.
References
Beard, C., & Wilson, J. P. (2015). Experiential learning: A handbook for
education, training and coaching. London: Kogan Page.
Corker, J. S., & Porter, D. J. (2015). Maximizing experiential learning to
student success. Change, 47 (1), 66–72.
Eyler, J. (2009, January 1). The power of experiential education. Liberal
Education, 95(4), 24–31.
Hesser, G. (Ed.). (2013). Strengthening experiential education: A new era. Mt.
Royal, NJ: National Society of Experiential Education.
1 INTRODUCTION: LISTENING AND LEARNING FROM EXPERIENTIAL … 11
Kuh, G.D., & O’Donnell, K. (2013). Ensuring quality and taking high-impact
practices to scale. Washington, DC: Association of American Colleges and
Universities.
McClellan, R., & Hyle, A. E. (2012, May 1). Experiential learning: Dissolving
classroom and research borders. Journal of Experiential Education, 35(1),
238–252.
Morris, L. V. (2016). Experiential learning for all. Innovative Higher Education,
41(2), 103–104. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10755-016-9361-z.
Roberts, J. W. (2016). Experiential education in the college context: What it is,
how it works, and why it matters. New York: Routledge.
CHAPTER 2
& Wardle, 2015). Beyond these concepts, grant writing offers a use-
ful way of addressing many of the types of skills that are important for
professional writing students to practice as part of their learning experi-
ence, skills such as primary research, collaborative writing, development
of workplace/professional genres, and rhetorical methods for tasks such
as interviewing, memoing, summarizing, and reporting. These skills and
practices, which are common across many types of Professional and Tech-
nical Writing curricula, are integrated within the development of grant
proposals through a multi-stage approach to research, writing, and dis-
semination.
Finally, grant writing provides us, as faculty at the University of Day-
ton, with a tangible means of enacting some of the most significant tenets
of the Common Academic Program (CAP), the university’s interdisci-
plinary general education program. Specifically, CAP courses are part of
sixteen types of courses built around a set of seven institutional learn-
ing goals. Beyond introductory-level coursework, students are required
to take “Crossing Boundaries” courses from areas outside of their own
major discipline “in order to see the relationship between the practical
and theoretical and to understand issues in a more integrative and holistic
perspective” (“The Common Academic Program,” 2010, p. 16). The par-
ticular type of course for which we teach grant writing falls within an “In-
quiry” category of Crossing Boundaries courses. Inquiry courses are cate-
gorized as such because they require students to investigate problems and
develop solutions using methodologies outside of those in their home dis-
cipline. In the case of our grant writing course, these methodologies are
drawn from the rhetoric and professional writing studies and include crit-
ical rhetorical analysis and qualitative research. Therefore, in addition to
providing English majors with experience and professional development
in grant writing, our coursework in grant writing also engages students
from other disciplines—especially social scientific, business administrative,
and scientific disciplines—in experiential learning as a way to understand
how professional writers work to solve problems and communicate effec-
tively, for money, within organizations.
Together, these interconnected sets of pedagogical goals—of experien-
tial learning, professional/technical writing, and our university’s general
education program—are meaningfully integrated through our approach
to the teaching of grant writing, which we describe in further detail below.
16 N. F. ADAMS AND P. W. THOMAS
Simulation Pedagogy
to Community-Engaged Grant Writing
Nicky, the first co-author of this chapter, offers the following narrative
describing her initial foray into teaching grant writing:
I came to the University in Fall of 2011, fresh out of graduate school, and
interested in the ways that I might expand course offerings in the area of
professional writing. After all, that was why I was hired.
In graduate school I had worked on a series of successful grant writ-
ing projects, most of which were funded, and so I knew first-hand how
empowering it was to be able to use my writing skills to further projects
that I cared about – especially educational projects for teachers. Despite
this, I had little “formal” training in grant writing, so I wasn’t sure I
could actually teach a course in which I had only practical experience.
However, when I arrived to campus, our first-year faculty orientation
included a three-hour tour of the city of Dayton, making stops at four
2 WHEN STUDENTS WRITE FOR MONEY … 17
local organizations with which the university had maintained active com-
munity learning projects. What was so memorable about that tour was
how many different types of organizations were represented: large non-
profit centers, start-up businesses, and even neighborhood programs. The
message of that tour was clear: UD, my new employer, cared about how it
helped the community. And that message was repeated multiple times over
my first year, as many folks in my department mentioned the possibilities
of engaging with local community partners to help build new opportuni-
ties for students with interest in writing. I was interested in doing this, but
without knowing which community agencies to target, or how to go about
doing so, I decided to begin with a smaller assignment for grant writing
instead.
For both of us, prior to including a grant writing course into our curric-
ular offerings, we each experimented with the prospect of grant writing
assignments in our other professional writing course, especially Report
and Proposal Writing, a course for non-majors focused on producing var-
ious types of the two genres. In this way, our approach mirrored the type
of “simulation pedagogy” (Wang, 2019), a popular pedagogical approach
in applied fields such as nursing, management, and computer science. In
this approach, instructors may construct simulated rhetorical situations in
which students practice producing appropriate kinds of texts to fit that
situation. Often, students benefit from this approach to practice profes-
sional writing skills because it offers a “low stakes” method of engaging in
the kinds of communicative situations that they can envision in contexts
outside the classroom.
The simulation approach to grant writing often took the form of an
instructor-supplied RFP (Request for Proposals, a solicitation for grant
proposals). As instructors, we could invent a funding organization, situa-
tion, and genre constraints and group students into grant writing teams
as a way to propose funding ideas aimed at this RFP. Student teams could
work to fulfill many of the aspects of the grant writing process in condi-
tions that we, as instructors, can easily control and alter as teams required.
In addition, students had the opportunity to select causes, issues, or cam-
paigns to which funding from the RFP organization would be applied.
This approach was successful in the way that it provided us with oppor-
tunities for experimenting with teaching the process of grant writing—
including research, genre knowledge, and team writing, all of which offer
students (who may or may not have interest in grant-making or grant
writing) useful practice in developing professional skills.
18 N. F. ADAMS AND P. W. THOMAS
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