Best-practices for Student-run Service Learning Organizations: A Case Study from Higher Education

This Innovative Practice full paper presents a series of practices that student-run service learning organizations may use to best ensure their effectiveness and longevity. Service learning has been firmly supported in the engineering disciplines, with a history of faculty support and solid evidence backing the value of service projects to student learning outcomes and preparation for later work. However, student-run groups face several unique difficulties compared withto faculty-led groups. To addressface this issue, this paper analyzes and applies relevant lessons from literature on Communities of Practice and Critical Success Factors to compile a set of best-practices that student-run service learning organizations may use to guarantee their continued positive impact. Throughout the analysis, the Computer Science for Good club at the University of Notre Dame is used to provide examples of the difficulties faced by student-run service learning groups as well as illustrations of potential solutions. The conclusion of the analysis is that there are a number of considerations that are especially pertinent to student-run organizations. By responding to these factors, these groups mitigate their disadvantages, such as frequent leadership changes, while benefiting from their advantages, such as the freedom to create the organizations mission and standards of work quality.