Abstract

In design classes of landscape architecture education, some professors strive to find real-world projects from the community for students to practice their design skills instead of giving students speculative projects. This paper described how a landscape architecture faculty with Extension appointment can function as a bridge between formal education and community service through service-learning. The lead faculty selected three community service projects for three different design classes to engage in this study and conducted the follow-up survey. Using four service-learning approaches: (1) real project-centered learning, (2) experiential learning experience, (3) client-professional interaction, and (4) community service awareness, this study examined how students were interested and motivated when they faced a real-world project versus a speculative project. It looked at student’ time spent engaged in a real-world project, and it revealed the benefits of being able to interact with clients during the design process of a real-world project. There were lessons learned during the working process of three service projects, and the study results confirmed that real-world projects provided benefits to students’ learning and facilitated better teaching outcomes in design education.