Community-driven service learning: Helping public health students link classroom material to policy change

Objectives: Holistic education requires strong theory, real-time exposure to issues, and opportunity to contribute meaningfully to a project advancing a cause that calls for action. We describe how these elements are incorporated in a graduate-level health disparities service learning course co-taught with a community partner.

Methods: Before the course, the faculty/community team selects a service learning project addressing a policy issue prioritized by the partnering organization, Arkansas Community Organizations (ACO). Faculty employ interactive pedagogy and ACO staff guest lecture and guide project implementation. Students interact with individuals directly affected through data collection and participate in reflection. Group data analysis and report writing result in a publishable product ACO disseminates to support its work. Example projects have included examining the health impacts of: neighborhood displacement through eminent domain for development, being uninsured, and Arkansas’s lack of an implied warranty of habitability law.

Results: ACO has valued having students and faculty partner on the work, and students have gained greater understanding of how policy and structural issues contribute to racial health disparities at individual and community levels. For example, students interviewed neighborhood residents to document their attitudes about a possible development that would displace them from their homes, attended public meetings, and observed direct actions by the “We Shall Not Be Moved” coalition. Ultimately, a non-residential area was selected. Another year, students interviewed uninsured Arkansans and later witnessed passage of Arkansas’ “Private Option” Medicaid expansion.

Conclusion: Community-academic service learning partnerships benefit community organizations and empower students with real-world applications of class material.