Sixteenth International Conference on Environmental, Cultural, Economic & Social Sustainability

Abstract

It is evident that service-learning (S-L) projects could have an effect on student learning more deeply than usual classroom learning. Students will gain a sense of engagement and accomplishment as they serve the community, learn, and have hands on experiences at the same time. The main purpose of this study is to encapsulate an integration of S-L projects with sustainability related topics into the class and describe intricacies of a semester long process. The specific projects students have worked on as a part of a public health courses such as Environmental Health (a graduate course), Sustainable Living and Development and Evaluation of Health Promotion Programs, (undergraduate courses) will be included as examples that have had meaningful outcomes as a part of community service. In addition, successes and failures of the projects and summary of student reflections will also be presented. Based on the decades of experiences, a set of recommendations will be provided to the audience, that they can use or replicate, if they desire, and integrate such experiential learning methods in teaching sustainability related topics into their classes.