Service Learning
Building a house for Habitat for Humanity
"The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others."
Mahatma Gandhi (1869-1948)
The mission of St. Ambrose Service Learning is to reinforce and implement the mission of St. Ambrose University to encourage Ambrosians to actively engage in service, and to enable students to "enrich their own lives and the lives of others." Service Learning allows students to enhance their academic learning through direct service to the larger community, and helps enhance an ethic of service within the students who are participating.
Check out the Community Partners blog to read about service agencies in the Quad Cities!
How is Service Learning different from community service?
Community service is completed by volunteers or an organization to benefit a community or its institutions.
Service Learning allows students to apply their academic learning in a service setting, enabling them to earn college credit.
Service Learning is beneficial because it...
Affirms our identity as Christians to serve the community in a variety of different ways while learning.
Offers students the chance to develop personally while obtaining and enhancing life and career skills learned in the classrooms, such as confidence, communication and time management skills.
Provides students with a way to develop social and interpersonal skills by allowing students to work in groups and connecting them with different generations. Other important aspects include learning the responsibility of civic duties and developing a sensitivity to other cultures and diverse socioeconomic populations.
Promotes the application of academic learning. Many service opportunities are directly related to students' classes. Furthermore, many situations encountered in the community allow students to develop problem solving skills while thinking ethically.
Enriches the local community by meeting the needs of the community by engaging students in opportunities outside of campus.
