Service Learning

Service Learning Program

What is service learning?
Service learning is an approach to education as old as formal instruction itself. Those interested in service learning believe that students can learn as much, or more, about subjects through experience and practice as through traditional classroom instruction alone.

PowerPoint presentation from Instruction Day - Friday, January 9, 2009

The modern service learning movement in colleges and universities creates opportunities for students to combine community work with academic perspectives to make higher education more valuable to students and more relevant to the community.

Mission Statement
The Service Learning Program (SLP) at Houston Community College is dedicated to promoting and coordinating service learning by HCC students. To this end, the program acts to:

• Serve as a clearinghouse for placing student volunteers.
  
• Disseminate information about community volunteer needs, the value of service learning and service-oriented innovations in curricula.
  
• Promote campus commitment to community service.
  

Campus Outreach

Helping to foster a "culture of service" around the campus brings immediate benefits to the community, the college, students and faculty. Service learning improves retention rates of students, increases their sense of civic responsibility and deepens their understanding of community issues.

SLP is committed to sponsoring campus events and to participating in conferences and in-services. Many campus organizations, individual staff, faculty members and students have long been actively engaged in the community. SLP seeks to coordinate these disparate efforts in order to enhance visibility and enthusiasm for community work.

The community gains from the unpaid work of service learners, while HCC furthers its outreach objectives. Faculty often finds that community work awakens their students to new perspectives, facilitates dialogue about academic materials and creates a concrete link between their classrooms and the surrounding community.

We invite you to become involved with this exciting opportunity to combine academic reflection with social practice.

Student Placement and Community Partnerships

SLP works to establish partnerships with non-profit organizations and with the community service sections of corporations within the college\'s service area.

Placement opportunities are available to students enrolled in classes with a community service component and to walk-in students. SLP maintains a searchable database of registered partners.

The program advocates a balanced service-learning approach, meeting the needs of the community while maintaining an academically rigorous campus environment.

Faculty Assistance

SLP is able to assist faculty in a variety of ways. Faculty have access to the library materials that SLP maintains, and assistance is available for curricular design and student placement. SLP personnel also can help with grant applications for service-learning projects. By arrangement, program representatives conduct orientation sessions, attend or facilitate reflection sessions and participate in project reviews and evaluations.

Information Services

SLP publicizes services and projects through campus and community media. SLP accumulates a library of materials about service-learning programs and about community partners willing to work with service learners.

President\'s Volunteer Service Award

Americans of all ages — individual, families and groups — are answering the President\'s call to service by making a difference in their communities. The President\'s Volunteer Service Award, an initiative of the President\'s Council on Service and Civic Participation, honors America\'s volunteers and encourages even more Americans to get involved.

HCC is an authorizing agency for the President\'s Volunteer Service Award. HCC students who have completed the required number of volunteer service hours are eligible for this annually awarded honor.

For more information, please contact the SLP office near you:

Dr. Larry Gonzalez
Director, HCC-SW SLP
13803 Bissonnet
Houston, TX 77083
Tel: 713.718.8611
Fax: 713.718.6914
Email:.slp@hccs.edu

Dr. Saundra Boyd
Director, HCC-CE SLP
1300 Holman
Houston, TX 77004
Tel: 713.718.6244
Fax: 713.718.6080
Email:.saundra.boyd@hccs.edu

Michelle Novak
Director, HCC-SE SLP
6815 Rustic
Houston, TX 77087
Tel: 713.718.7143
Fax: 713.718.7157
Email: michelle.novak@hccs.edu