Are you thinking of teaching with experiential learning? Check out why Christie Fuller decided to integrate service-learning in her Predictive Analytics class. Listen to how she explains service-learning to motivate and excite students about their class project. You’ll hear why she concludes, “Watching your students raise their level of performance because they want to impact their community, is so worth any effort you put into it.”
Great Ideas for Teaching and Learning Symposium
The Benefits of Service Learning with Dr. Christie Fuller, Assistant Professor in the Department of Information Technology and Supply Chain Management. She answers the following questions:
- Why did you decide to use service-learning and why did you continue?
- How can service-learning increase students’ motivation to learn?
- How do you motivate students to excel with service-learning?
- Final thoughts for faculty considering SL?
Video Transcript
[Music]
I’m Christy Fuller I’m an associate professor in the information technology and Supply Chain management department I use Service Learning and ITM 430 and ITM 530 my Predictive Analytics class and I also use Service Learning in MBA 509 my data management and analytics class.
[Music] Title card: Why did you decide to use service-learning and why did you continue?
So back in 2018 in my personal life I decided it was important to get involved with my community and then that summer I had an opportunity to do a volunteer project working on data for you the United Way and that led me to wow I had so much fun doing this project myself for the United Way um how could we expand that into my class. So I started looking for partners and connected with one and we just did one project at the end of the semester and I thought oh this could work or this could be terrible and blow up in my face and the students just blew me away um by the level of work they produced and how excited they were to work with not only real world data but have an actual client and partner and give back to their community and then it’s just snowballed from there and yes it creates work and you’re constantly meeting with these finding partners and adapting to these partners but the rewards you get um from knowing you’ve helped impact your community but watching your students raise their level of performance because they want to impact their community it’s just so worth any work that you ever might put into it.
[Music] Title card: How can service-learning increase students’ motivation to learn?
My class is predictive analytics which is all about data analysis and even the students walk in at the beginning of the semester thinking that data is this very black and white thing and then I start um giving them my first day lecture which gets into the into even how data can save lives and I get so passionate when I start talking about all the ways that data has changed the world and can change the world and talk about the partners we’ve worked with and who we’re going to be working with and we quickly go from data being this cold black and white thing and it’s all about making money to data is this thing that you know it isn’t black and white because there’s a lot more it’s not just the technology but all these wonderful things that we can do with it to impact our community and I also encourage them to think of it as you may have thought of volunteering as knocking on doors or standing at a table and I do those things as a volunteer for organizations I believe in but bringing this perspective of through your education you’re going to gain unique skills that a non-profit might not have and you can take your unique expertise from your education from your career and use that to give back to your community so it’s a whole different perspective on what volunteerism and contributing to your community can mean.
[Music] Title card: How do you motivate students to excel with service-learning?
A key part of that is again we start from the beginning of the semester talking about all the time about all these projects we have or are going to do but for the students I think the moment they really start to get it is the day the first client visits class and that at that moment they’re taking what I’ve been talking about from the textbook and all of a sudden it becomes real and for them and then at that moment you just see them engage and they’re off running and they want to do the best that they can um for that volunteer so they in a side effect of that is I think they learn the material so much better than before I was doing Service Learning because they’ve just engaged with it at this whole different level and they know that it’s not just me grading the assignment when they’re done it’s that somebody out in the community is reading this so that they can make this a better place to live and improve people’s lives I love that and that’s just a whole different thing for them and they haven’t experienced it usually before they get to my class but any and they’re seniors so they’re just a few steps from going out into the world which I think also gives them a different appreciation of actually work doing a real world type project.
[Music] Title card: Final thoughts for faculty considering SL?
It’s a really important um that you really believe in it but you take the leap and know that it’s going to pay off um both in knowing you’ve served your community your students have served the community um but also just how much more the students learn and when the students are really learning and really engaged that’s when your job as a teacher is most fun because once the students are excited and engaged you know I feed off of that excitement.