Mackenzie Sara L C, Hinchey Deborah M, Cornforth Kathryn P
Department of Health Services, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, United States.
Department of Biomedical and Health Sciences, University of Vermont, Burlington, VT, United States.
Front Public Health. 2019 Jan 29;7:10. doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2019.00010. eCollection 2019.
Undergraduate public health degree programs strive to educate students to improve the health of communities. As such we have an obligation to develop curricula that push students to think critically about their perspectives, examine assumptions, and provide supported opportunities to apply their academic learning. In addition, curricula ideally develop and nurture students' sense of civic responsibility. Community-engaged learning provides opportunities for students to interact with populations with a range of needs and different perspectives. Students need to be prepared to engage ethically and respectfully, while thinking critically about and reflecting on their roles in these communities. Service-learning is a high-impact practice that combines community service with structured academic learning, including preparation, and reflection. In line with public health community-based work, a key aspect of service-learning is the intentional development of community partnerships to ensure that students are filling the needs defined by the communities themselves. Accreditation criteria may guide what is taught but say little about how it should be taught. However, how we teach matters. Service-learning is a high impact practice that not only aligns well with the goals and objectives of an accreditation required culminating senior experience but shares many of the values of the discipline of public health. This paper analyzes the use of service-learning in the development and delivery of the University of Washington School of Public Health undergraduate Public Health-Global Health majors' culminating experience. We describe the course learning objectives, structure, and assessment tools. In addition, we present quantitative and qualitative results on the impact of the course. We argue that it is feasible, sustainable, and beneficial to students and communities when the high impact practice of service-learning is used in delivery of a culminating senior experience.
本科公共卫生学位项目致力于培养学生,以改善社区健康状况。因此,我们有义务开发课程,促使学生批判性地思考自己的观点、审视假设,并提供有支持的机会来应用他们的学术知识。此外,课程理想情况下应培养和培育学生的公民责任感。社区参与式学习为学生提供了与有各种需求和不同观点的人群互动的机会。学生需要做好准备,以道德和尊重的方式参与,同时批判性地思考并反思自己在这些社区中的角色。服务学习是一种高影响力的实践,它将社区服务与结构化的学术学习相结合,包括准备和反思。与基于社区的公共卫生工作一致,服务学习的一个关键方面是有意发展社区伙伴关系,以确保学生满足社区自身确定的需求。认证标准可能会指导教学内容,但对教学方式却很少提及。然而,我们的教学方式很重要。服务学习是一种高影响力的实践,它不仅与认证要求的本科最后一年总结性实践的目标高度契合,还体现了公共卫生学科的许多价值观。本文分析了服务学习在华盛顿大学公共卫生学院本科公共卫生 - 全球健康专业最后一年总结性实践的开发和实施中的应用。我们描述了课程学习目标、结构和评估工具。此外,我们展示了关于该课程影响的定量和定性结果。我们认为,在本科最后一年总结性实践中采用服务学习这种高影响力的实践对学生和社区来说是可行、可持续且有益的。