engleski

Service-Learning and Social Interventions - lessons learned from introducing S-L course to the first-year social work students during the corona pandemic

Field education is, and had always been, an important part of social work education (Bogo, 2020) however, with moving towards the competency- based model, it became evident that more emphasis on reflection and critical thinking was needed to maximize learning outcomes leading to practice competency (McGuire & Lay, 2019). Therefore, to enhance the development of generic competencies of first-year social work students (by including reflection and critical thinking as a key part of the field education), but also to empower and encourage them for a more active engagement in the community - an elective course “Service-Learning and Social Interventions” was developed and offered to first-year social work students in the summer semester of academic 2020/2021. Present work seeks to reveal students’ perceptions of gains from participating in S-L projects, satisfaction with different elements of the course and suggested modification related to the improvement of the course. At the end of the semester, a total of 23 students anonymously filled in a questionnaire consisted of 13 questions. Qualitative analysis revealed several themes regarding gains from participating in the S-L project: personal gains (sensitization for the needs of others, facing new challenges, becoming aware of own’s potential, familiarising with the profession), improving knowledge and skills (teamwork, project management, acquiring new knowledge), gains for beneficiaries (direct forms of help), community partner (investing time and knowledge to address the needs of the community partner) and the broader community (possibility of influence on the civic level, contribution to volunteering and engagement in community). Students evaluated several elements of the course (choice of the community partner ; characteristics of the beneficiaries ; cooperation within the team ; subject, implementation and outcome of the project ; support from the community partner and the teacher) using grades (from 1-min to 5-max) and their average assessment (M = 4, 44 to M = 5, 00) suggests that students were generally highly satisfied with all those aspects of the course, they were really contented with enrolling the course (M = 4.71) and believed that it greatly enabled them a better understanding of social work practices. While many students stated that changes were not necessary, that they liked the course very much and found it extremely useful, some proposed modifications related to the way of teaching (organisation of the classes and field education), project implementation (preparation and timing) and monitoring (different ways of monitoring student progress during a project). Although some specific issues raised were related to the hybrid model of the course (introduced due to the corona pandemic), current findings will be used to consider possible modifications of the course methods making it even more useful and user-friendly. Additionally, present findings will provide the basis for further, more extensive research on the effectiveness of service-learning in social work education in Croatia – contributing to evidence-based practices in service-learning within this area (Lemieux & Allen, 2007).

service-learning ; first-year social work students ; gains ; satisfaction ; improvement

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