Service-learning and academic activism: a review, prospects, and a time for revival

Abstract

Service-learning is an educational movement with roots in academic activism fuelled by commitments to accessibility, social mobility, social justice, community engagement, sustainable development, and learning. Reviewing the voices of the original US ‘pioneers’ and contemporary practitioners over the last 30 years, this chapter argues that (1) contemporary service learning has been ‘mainstreamed’ in various ways, and that (2) such a re-conceptualisation seems to have re-formatted educational commitments in line with contemporary economic-framings and circumstances of higher education. However, it also argues that beyond overt compliance and resistance, it is possible for practitioners and higher education more broadly to create responses and spaces where educational adaptation and transformation can emerge. To facilitate such responses, it is important to embrace the strong driving force of passion and emotion which can drive and sustain change agents in practice. This chapter aspires to revitalise and rejuvenate academic activism as a legitimate catalyst of educational transformation on a global platform.