Laura Shepko

ENGL 6702
Kirk St.Amant
Research Proposal- CAP Major Project
Submitted on 13 November 2017
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Research Proposal for Service Learning in Distance Education Courses

Introduction

Service learning is a teaching method which allows students to provide service to their

community while learning how to apply the knowledge gained in real-world applications. While

proven successful by instructors in the field of technical and professional communication, there

remains a gap that graduate students in distance education courses have rarely participated in

service learning. Technical and professional communication instructors should implement

service learning in their online courses because it provides their students with a way to apply

methods learned in the classroom to real-life scenarios while helping the community. More

research needs to be done to prove to the field that service learning in online education is

successful and holds the same benefits to online students as it does to students in a traditional

classroom. The plan for this proposed research uses a graduate level group of students in distance

education technical and professional communication courses. Quantitative and qualitative data

will be gathered through students reflective journals and a survey to better gather how the

students responded to their service learning projects.

Literature Review

Service learning in online classes is a topic which has not been researched much,

especially in the field of technical and professional communication. Early studies of service

learning in technical and professional communication courses have included studies such as

Matthews and Zimmerman's (1999) "Integrating Service Learning and Technical

Communication: Benefits and Challenges." The article included "a semester-long qualitative

study of an upper-division technical communication class" which was held in a traditional

classroom (p. 384). This study was one of the first qualitative studies for the field as this data
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method best showed the benefits of service learning. Matthews and Zimmerman found that "for

some students, the nature of learning in this service-learning class was vastly different from the

type of learning they were used to" (p. 396). Although this learning method was so different for

students, the authors believe that service learning provides students with greater opportunities to

have control over their own learning.

Sapp and Crabtree (2002) in "A Laboratory in Citizenship: Service Learning in the

Technical Communication Classroom" propose that service learning should be implemented in

the technical communication classroom and give three examples of service learning projects in

graduate and undergraduate courses. These examples were all held in traditional classrooms and

one service learning project that involved graduate students used written reports, portfolios, oral

presentations, and reflection journals to evaluate the benefits of service learning (p. 421). Like

Matthews and Zimmerman, Sapp and Crabtree chose qualitative methods of analysis and added

new evaluations with an emphasis on reflection as "the importance of a meaningful reflection

process can not be overemphasized" (p. 426). Through reflection, both students and faculty can

"bring our entire selves into the learning processcognition, action, and emotion" (p. 426).

In 2007, Turnley's article "Integrating Critical Approaches to Technology and Service-

Learning Projects" introduced the importance of technical skills that students need in the

professional realm. To develop these skills, Turnley notes that many technical communication

instructors are "turning to service learning as a means to encourage students' professional,

intellectual, and civic engagement" (p. 104). Like Sapp and Crabtree (2002), Turnley believes

that a focus on reflection, specifically reflecting on technical usage, benefits students learning.

Turnley's students were undergraduates in a traditional technical and professional

communication class who were tasked to meet with their service learning clients, propose and
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finalize documents they recommended for their clients, and provide a reflection on how

"technology affected their project participation" (p. 119). This course was not given through

online means, but Turnley kept the focus of the course on technology and with Soria and

Weiners (2013) A Virtual Fieldtrip: Service Learning in Distance Education Technical

Writing Courses, the topic of service learning was moving towards online means.

Soria and Weiner look at what they see as a major gap in the literature in technical and

professional communication service learning publications. According to Soria and Weiner, the

only research about service learning that has been conducted has been in face-to-face

undergraduate classes. Their article set out to provide online technical writing students with the

same benefits of service learning as their face-to-face peers. Soria and Weiner studied an online

technical writing class where service learning took the place of one of the students homework

assignments. The authors stated that the virtual experience of an online course became a real

world experience on several levels (p. 195). Even though the students were not face-to-face

with the community partners they were working with, they still gained the benefits of creating

assignments to be used in the community, worked to solve real problems, and made connections

between service learning and course assignments. Soria and Weiner showed technical and

professional communication instructors that service learning can be done in an online

environment and that their students will gain the same experiences as those in face-to-face

classes.

Written a year after Soria and Weiners article, Bourelles article (2014) Adapting

Service-Learning into the Online Technical Communication Classroom: A Framework and

Model notes the new term of service-eLearning and like Soria and Weiner, Bourelle looks at

an online technical communication course that has implemented service learning. Bourelle was
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less focused on how service learning was handled by students in online classes and more focused

on what the students gained from service learning and how that translated into their workplace

like Turnley (2007). In her service-eLearning study, Bourelle found a drawback in online

service learning of communication between the service partner and the students (p. 260). This

caused students to feel unheard during their projects and left them wondering about feedback

from their service partner. Bourelle responded to this by quoting Kastman-Breuch (2001) that

seeking affirmation is somewhat problematic, as it may not provide students with realistic

feedback on workplace documents (p. 260). Even the downfalls in service-eLearning may

prove to be beneficial to students because it provides a real-world example, although it may be

harsh. Overall, Bourelles article found that service eLearning was a benefit to online students

because they carried on the skills they learned into their workplace.

Service learning in an online classroom, or service-eLearning as later coined by

Bourelle, was proven to be successful in an online classroom and proved valuable to online

students. Being in an online environment may cause some communication issues, but as Bourelle

pointed out, this will only prepare students for the workplace. Soria and Weiner (2013) also

noted that service learning proves beneficial to not only the students, but their community as

well.

From the community aspect, Kimme Hea and Wendler Shah (2016) discuss the

challenges and benefits that community partners face when involved in service learning projects.

"Silent Partners: Developing a Critical Understanding of Community Partners in Technical

Communication Service-Learning Pedagogies" acknowledges "four areas of productive tension

that community partners identify as affecting their stakes in participation and even their

satisfaction in collaborations with students" (p. 49). These four areas include, receiving resources
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means giving resources, partners are clients and teachers, the need for plans and flexibility, and

coming to an agreement on the interests of the students and partners (p. 49). Kimme Hea and

Wendler Shah studied former community partners that had participated in service learning to

discover how they see their roles in these projects, their motivation for participation, and their

expectations (pp. 51-52). The authors discovered that community partners are cautious of the

resources they give to student service learners, unsure of their role in educating these students,

and are focused on flexibility and student motivation. Community partners expect a certain

outcome from service learning agreements and instructors leading the course need to make these

partners aware of realistic expectations and most importantly, their role as an organization

participating in this project.

Instructors wishing to implement service learning in their online technical

communication courses can learn from Kimme Hea and Wendler Shahs study of community

partners, but they can also learn from Nielsens (2016) article Facilitating Service Learning in

the Online Technical Communication Classroom. Nielsen remarks that with the increase in

online education comes an increase in service learning in technical communication classes (p.

237). From this recent literature, authors are no longer concerned about how service learning

may be used in technical communication courses, but what service learnings role is in an online

setting and how it can best meet the needs of the students. Since online students can be located

anywhere, Nielsen suggests that students be given the option to meet with their service partners

face-to-face or through entirely virtual means (p. 242-243). Like Sapp and Crabtree (2002) and

Turnley (2007), Nielsen emphasizes the benefits of reflection as Without the reflective

component, it is difficult for students to make a connection between the service they do, the

course content they learn, and their own civic engagement (p. 247). Nielsen also believes that
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choice is important so that students can find service partners that match up with their interests

and being online, students are not region locked to a particular partner. With the growth in online

learning comes the growth in service learning and Nielsen proposes that online service learning

will give students more choices for community partners and will expand the field of technical

and professional communication.

Research Question or Problem

The question this proposed research wishes to address is does service learning provide

distance education students with the same benefits as students in a traditional classroom? When

this topic is researched, the main data collection method will be reflective journals collecting

qualitative data. Online surveys will also be given at the end of the course to ask quantitative

questions. Through these methods of data collection and guided research, individuals in the field

of technical and professional communication will see the value of service learning and in turn,

instructors will have a better idea of how to implement service learning in their online courses.

Soria and Weiner (2013) and Nielsen (2016) have already put into place service learning in their

online courses. The overwhelming response from Soria and Weiners students were that they had

a positive experience and were grateful for the opportunity to help their community. These

responses were collected through a reflective journal which the students completed at the end of

the semester with regards to their service learning experience. Nielsens study was a collection of

her online teaching and service learning experience and showed that reflection through methods

like journaling were the most useful to student learning.

While Soria and Weiners students had nothing but positive feedback when responding to

their service learning experience, Bourelles (2014) students found that they had trouble

communicating with their partners in service-eLearning. This may be seen as negative for
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online students wishing to be a part of service learning, but Bourelle notes that communication

issues happen in the real-world and these issues were actually beneficial to students who will

join the workforce. Soria and Weiner back up this idea of real-world applications by stating that

service learning is encouraging students to connect with their audience(s) and develop a sense

of purpose for writing tasks, connecting students to future employment, and developing deeper

learning with course materials (p. 195). Kimme Hea and Wendler Shahs (2016) study of

community partners mentions that communication may be an issue like Bourelle saw in her

study, but this can be resolved by ensuring the partners, students, and instructor all understand

the expectations of their service learning agreement.

This proposed research project will further discuss the benefits of online service learning

mentioned by authors in technical and professional communication in recent years. By having

another research project conducted on distance education students, instructors will be able to see

if service learning is an entirely positive experience as stated by Soria and Weiner (2013) or has

drawbacks as seen in Bourelles (2014) article. This proposed research project hopes to shed

more light on student feedback to determine what negatives and positives service learning has for

distance education students.

Research Method or Approach

This research project will be conducted on distance education students in graduate level

courses because little research on service learning has been done on both graduate students and

online courses. The distance education students will be from the technical and professional

communication concentration in East Carolina Universitys English Masters program. The

students will participate in a service learning project in conjunction with a local nonprofit
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organization in Greenville, North Carolina. Reflective journals and an online survey will be used

so that instructors can evaluate student learning outcomes.

First Approach: Journal

So that qualitative data can be collected from the students, they will be instructed to

complete an online service learning journal throughout their experience. Their online journal will

be completed through a Microsoft Word document or a Google Document and emailed to the

instructor every Friday. The students will be active in their service learning project at least once

a week and need to complete a reflective entry of their experience weekly. The weekly journal

will have to answer questions such as: What was your main task this week? What did you like or

dislike about the task? Have you applied anything you have learned in this class to this weeks

task?

At the end of the semester, the students will write a comprehensive journal entry

discussing their overall experience. The questions for this entry will include: What did you do in

your service learning project? What did you learn about the issues the community faces? Did you

apply lessons learned in this class to your service learning project? How was your overall

experience? What would you suggest could be improved either in the course or in the service

learning project?

A weekly journal entry will help students reflect on their learning like Sapp and Crabtree

(2002), Turnely (2007), Soria and Weiner (2013), and Nielsen (2016) noted in their studies. Sapp

and Crabtree, Turnely, and Nielsen all mention how reflection is an important inclusion to

service learning courses and that journal entries are the best method for student reflection.

Students will not only be tasked to create documents, but they will reflect on why their service is

important to their community partner and what learning they as students are gaining from this
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experience. A longer, comprehensive journal entry is the second method which can show how

the students felt overall about their service learning experience. Matthews and Zimmerman

(1999) gave examples of their students comments on service learning made in classroom

discussions. For an online setting, the journal entry will be made private and not shared with

classmates as students may not be as willing to share their true thoughts with their groupmates or

classmates. An end of semester comprehensive journal entry given to the instructor will allow

students to explain what they liked and did not like about their service learning experience.

Second Approach: Survey

The students will also complete an end of semester online survey collecting quantitative

data. This method will be used with the reflective journals to give students the opportunity to

remain anonymous. Students may not be as willing to be honest with their experience when they

know their name is attached and will be scrutinized by their instructor. The anonymous survey

will have basic scaled statements (all with strongly agree, agree, neutral, disagree, strongly

disagree, and not applicable as answer choices) such as: I enjoyed my service learning

experience. I felt more aware of the issues surrounding the community. I feel better prepared to

enter the workforce. I used lessons learned in the course in my service learning. I would

participate in a service learning project in a future course if given the chance.

Kimme Hea and Wendler Shah (2016) used surveys with scaled responses to gain

information about the community partners they interviewed while Soria and Weiner (2013) used

surveys to judge student learning outcomes. Surveys can be used for service learning students so

that instructors can get quantitative information as qualitative student responses are subjective.

Demographic questions will also be used such as: age, gender, major, year in program, and the
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students location. This quantitative survey will give the instructor insight into the demographics

of their class as well as how successful the outcomes of service learning were to their students.

Basis of Methods

The online reflective journal was adapted from Soria and Weiner (2013), but was

adjusted to have students write throughout their service learning experience as well as at the end

of the semester. Sapp and Crabtree (2002), Turnely (2007), and Nielsen (2016) emphasized the

importance of reflection, so having two reflective journals is important to evaluate student

learning outcomes. The questions in the end of course reflective journal and survey were based

from Bourelles (2014) research questions. The survey was a data collection method used by

Soria and Weiner, but their survey was used to rate students self-reported learning outcomes and

not their response to service learning. Kimme Hea and Wendler Shah (2016) also used surveys to

gain insight into their community partners and their inclusion of demographic questions is

crucial to seeing how an online service learning course works to a variety of student. By

combining these methods of qualitative data, quantitative data, reflective journals, and surveys in

a distance education graduate level course, the gap in the literature regarding online service

learning will be closer to being filled.

Conclusion

Service learning in graduate level distance education courses has not been fully studied

and this research proposal sets out to study student feedback in order to determine what students

gain from service learning in an online setting. Reflective journals and a survey will be the two

data collection methods used to see how the students responded to their service learning projects.

This proposed research project contains a crucial aspect of reflection which allows the instructor

to see student development happening in real-time.

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Instructors wishing to implement service learning into their online classrooms should do

so based on the above research and proposed research plan. Using my proposed research plan,

instructors may feel that they have more work to do by analyzing qualitative data from every

student in their course, but this factor is necessary in order to fill the gap of online service

learning. Once more research has been done in graduate level online service learning, the data

collection method of writing weekly in a reflective journal can be decreased to a monthly basis

or used just at the end of the course. Having a comprehensive online survey at the end of the

course will be useful to the instructor who wishes to improve their course by continuing to use

service learning projects. Online service learning in graduate level courses has proven effective,

but with the added proposed research project, members of the field will be able to see student

growth throughout the project which is essential to the research.

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References

Bourelle, T. (2014). Adapting service-learning into the online technical communication

classroom: A framework and model. Technical Communication Quarterly, 23(4), 247-

264. doi:10.1080/10572252.2014.941782

Kimme Hea, A. C., & Wendler Shah, R. (2016). Silent partners: Developing a critical

understanding of community partners in technical communication service-learning

pedagogies. Technical Communication Quarterly, 25(1). doi:

10.1080/10572252.2016.1113727

Matthews, C., & Zimmerman, B. B. (1999). Integrating service learning and technical

communication: Benefits and challenges. Technical Communication Quarterly, 8(4),

383-404. doi: 10.1080/10572259909364676

Nielsen, D. (2016). Facilitating service learning in the online technical communication

classroom. Journal of Technical Writing and Communication, 46(2), 236-256. doi:

10.1177/0047281616633600

Sapp, D. A., & Crabtree, R. D. (2002). A laboratory in citizenship: Service learning in the

technical communication classroom. Technical Communication Quarterly, 11(4), 411-

431. Retrieved from http://dx.doi.org/10.1207/s15427625tcq1104_3

Soria, K.M., & Weiner, B. (2013). A virtual fieldtrip: Service learning in distance education

technical writing courses. Journal of Technical Writing and Communication, 43(2), 181-

200. doi:10.2190/TW.43.2.e

Turnley, M. (2007). Integrating critical approaches to technology and service-learning projects.

Technical Communication Quarterly, 16(1), 103-123. Retrieved from http://www-

tandfonline-com.jproxy.lib.ecu.edu/doi/abs/10.1080/10572250709336579