Service-Learning Across Cultures: Promise and Achievement

This book, the culmination of a three-year, three-part study funded by the Ford Foundation, explores the effects of international service-learning on the students who participate, the institutions where they study, and the agencies where they perform their service. It tells us that international service-learning is a transforming experience for all concerned, and a means through which we can create citizens and individuals who are responsive to the needs of others, civically engaged, and prepared for a peaceful future based on the globalization of compassion, tolerance, and understanding. The conclusions, based on sound research, provide useful advice to those initiating service-learning; those seeking to make the practice of international service-learning an ongoing commitment of their college or university; and those eager to encourage participation in study abroad programs that immerse students in the foreign culture, thereby making education abroad as rich and beneficial as possible for the students. (publisher)