District Lessons: Number Four

In 2001, the Board of Education of Chicago Public Schools amended the community service requirement to include service-learning. This issue of District Lessons describes how a community service requirement in a large urban school district evolved into service-learning. Jon Schmidt, director of the Chicago Public Schools service-learning initiative, provides insight into the challenges of implementing a districtwide service-learning initiative while supporting high-quality practice. The District Lessons series aims to strengthen member-to-member dialogue about integrating service-learning at the school district level. To read other District Lessons, and to learn more about district initiatives, visit http://www.service-learningpartnership.org/publications.

FROM COMMUNITY SERVICE TO SERVICE-LEARNING: THE CHICAGO PUBLIC SCHOOLS EXPERIENCE
By Jon Schmidt, Service-Learning Manager, Chicago Public Schools

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It is vital that our students have the chance to learn to be citizens and leaders through service that actively engages them in the real problems of our schools and our communities. (Arne Duncan, CEO, Chicago Public Schools)

A SERVICE POLICY EMERGES
The Chicago service-learning story began in 1997. The Board of Education of Chicago Public Schools (CPS) convened a panel of educators and community leaders to explore the feasibility of requiring students to engage in service activities as a graduation requirement. After a year of study, the panel recommended adding a service-learning requirement to existing graduation requirements. The requirement was to be phased in, with service tied explicitly to classroom learning and sufficient funding provided for professional development.

Contrary to the panel's recommendation, the Board of Education chose a community service requirement that did not integrate students' service activities into their academic studies. The Board felt that community service would be a positive way for students to develop healthy attitudes about volunteerism while delivering hundreds of thousands of hours of service to neighborhoods throughout the city. All 104,000 high school students in 85 schools had to perform a minimum of 40 hours of service during grades 9-12 in order to graduate. The school district funded a full-time director of community service to coordinate the implementation of the requirement and funded a stipend for one faculty member at each high school to serve as a community service coach. The role of the coach was to network with community organizations to generate service opportunities and track student progress. Each school received $4 per student for the coach stipend and for other supports such as student transportation and supplies.

The district did not encourage schools to link service to learning. One factor was that service hours could not be earned during the school day. Further, apart from an annual one-day conference, teachers did not have access to professional development related to the service requirement. Students fulfilled the requisite number of hours, in many cases, without adequate preparation, guidance, or opportunities for meaningful reflection. Schools were directed to help students locate community organizations around the city or sponsor schoolwide activities to complete the service requirement. Nevertheless, many students sought out options in schools that could fulfill the requirement, such as cleaning classrooms and filing. Although community service was the norm, a small number of teachers and schools did actively promote service-learning on their own. In recognition of exemplary service-learning practice, Jones College Prep was named a National Service-Learning Leader School in 2000 under the leadership of Dr. Cynthia Barron.

By the beginning of the fourth year of the service requirement, in 2001, skepticism throughout the school district existed as to whether the community service requirement should be continued. Recognizing the enormous potential of strengthening classroom learning through service-learning, district administrators decided to change the graduation requirement from community service to service-learning. This shift occurred because of a number of changes in the central office. Arne Duncan became the new CEO of Chicago Public Schools. Duncan came to the district with deep roots in Chicago's communities and a strong commitment to positive youth development. In fact, Duncan had served as the first director of community service from 1998-1999. Duncan recognized the importance of building a holistic educational environment where schools respond to both the academic and social development needs of young people. At this time, the author was also hired as the new director of the service-learning initiative to lead the transition to service-learning.

Many critics of the new requirement argued that teachers were already over-burdened and would resist another classroom demand. With this skepticism in mind, the service-learning initiative immediately focused the resources of its office on helping teachers learn how to use service-learning as a classroom teaching strategy through intensive professional development offerings. The district hosted the first four-day Summer Service-Learning Institute in August 2002 with 30 participants from 15 high schools from across the district. The Institute uncovered a gold mine: a cadre of teachers hungry to provide experiential learning opportunities, to make learning relevant to their students, to provide students with opportunities to collaborate for positive social change, and to bring creativity and joy into their classrooms. Service-learning became that opportunity for teachers. Teachers did not regard service-learning as a distraction from the all-important achievement test preparation; instead, they believed that students would become more engaged in learning through service projects. Teachers also found a tremendous outlet for their own creativity that had been stifled. At the end of the first summer institute, one teacher said: "Thank you for this opportunity. This is why I became a teacher in the first place."

CONNECTING SERVICE-LEARNING TO THE SCHOOL REFORM AGENDA
Under Duncan's leadership in June 2001, CPS introduced a new education plan to guide school reform efforts in eight areas. Service-learning complements five of the plan's eight areas as follows:

1. Build instructional capacity by providing students with differentiated, engaging, and challenging curriculum.Service-learning engages students in active ways in their own learning, challenging them to solve problems in their schools and communities.

2. Develop learning communities and professional development where teams of teachers work with other school staff to create a work and school environment of problem solving, innovation, and reflection on practice.Through service-learning, CPS provides multiple opportunities for teachers to plan together and collaborate in order to implement and evaluate service-learning projects.

3. Provide support for student development through which schools will be student-centered environments that provide relationships, experiences, and support.Student voice is an exceptionally important component of the service-learning experience and is at the heart of creating a student-centered environment. Both teachers and students identify the tremendous value of working on community projects together that dramatically transform the nature of relationships among students and between students and teachers.

4.Rethink schools as centers of communities through working in partnership with families, community agencies, universities, and civic communities to promote student achievement.Through service-learning, schools are beginning to interact with their communities in new ways that bring community issues into the classroom and take students out into their neighborhoods. Many schools report that students are now seen in a whole new light as ambassadors from school to community. Community organizations also report a new openness by schools to viewing them as partners in the educational process.

5.Strengthen existing high school programs by placing a high priority on developing a range of programs to provide students with schooling that prepares them for college, work and citizenship. Service-learning provides students with opportunities to explore, in authentic ways, the worlds of postsecondary education, work and democratic citizenship.

FUNDING AND STAFF
Currently the service-learning budget of $690,000 is comprised of local funds and federal grants. The district appropriates $540,000 annually, at $4 per student, in central operating funds to support staffing, professional development, transportation, and project supplies for the service-learning initiative at the high school level. CPS does not have the luxury of funding the service-learning initiative at the level that would guarantee success at all grade levels, K-12. Nevertheless, the district is able to fund the initiative at a level exceeding school districts across the country.

Staffing for the initiative consists of a full-time director of service-learning in addition to part-time service-learning coaches based at each high school. The director of service-learning is housed at central office in the Office of High School Programs. The principal at each school identifies a faculty member to serve as a service-learning coach based on experience, commitment, and desire to work with students, teachers, and the community.

In addition to the district's financial support, the Illinois State Board of Education provides support to the initiative through a Learn and Serve America grant, totaling $150,000 a year for three years. The Learn and Serve America funds are subgranted to 40 pilot-project schools that have demonstrated a readiness to integrate service across the curriculum. Projects initiated by community partners also receive some financial support through Learn and Serve America funds. During the 2004-05 academic year approximately 19,000 students in the 40 pilot schools participated in over 600 classroom-integrated, service-learning projects.

The Illinois State Board of Education recently changed the focus of its Learn and Serve funding from supporting individual projects around the state to investing in districtwide implementation strategies that make professional development a priority. In 2004 CPS received a grant to provide districtwide professional development to begin to scale service-learning. The state's new funding philosophy promotes high-quality practice that is more likely to be sustained because of district-level support and professional development.

CPS has secured other external grants to support the service-learning initiative. In partnership with United Cerebral Palsy of Greater Chicago, the school district received a two-year, $200,000 federal grant from the Department of Health and Human Services. This grant enables high school students to work with developmentally disabled students on inclusive, service-learning experiences. In addition, through CPS partnerships with community organizations, the Chicago Civic Innovation Consortium received a grant from the National Service-Learning Partnership's W.K. Kellogg Foundation Youth Innovation Fund to support a $100,000, three-year investment to develop a youth-led, civic action initiative tied explicitly to service-learning.

BUILDING CHICAGO PUBLIC SCHOOLS' SERVICE-LEARNING SYSTEM
It is a daunting task to scale an instructional innovation in a district with more than 100 high schools and 100,000 students. CPS developed a strategic plan, the Service-Learning Pilot Project Initiative, to reach all high schools in six years, in increments of 15 schools a year, beginning with the 2002-03 school year. After three years of implementation, over 40 participating schools report between 15-20% of their faculty guiding curriculum-integrated service projects that meet state learning standards. Some schools have moved forward even more ambitiously with 100% of teachers expected to use service-learning as a teaching methodology.

Examples of service-learning experiences include:

• Environmental science students restore wetland ecosystems.
• Sociology class students study the roots of homelessness and rehabilitate a transitional apartment.
• Mainstream and general education students collaborate to build an outdoor learning center.

U.S. History and Voter Mobilization
In a U.S. history course, students learned about the Civil Rights movement. Two important components of the Civil Rights movement were the grassroots voter registration, education, and mobilization work done by many activists and the advocacy effort aimed at passing the Voting Rights Acts of 1964 and 1965. The class decided to enhance their understanding of voter mobilization by collaborating with Operation Rainbow/PUSH, a national civil rights organi-zation located in Chicago. Operation Rainbow/PUSH provided educational and logistical support to help students develop their own voter turn-out campaign. At the culmi-nation of the campaign, the teacher guided students through a process of reflection to help them connect their experiences to the classroom study of the Civil Rights movement and understand the decline in voter participa-tion over the past decades.

To encourage deeper engagement in service-learning of both teachers and students throughout the four years of high school, the board of education approved a new policy requiring students to earn 20 hours of service to be promoted to junior status. The new policy was put in place because far too many students were waiting until the last weeks of the senior year to complete the service requirement of 40 hours to graduate. As an added benefit, the new policy was designed to send a signal to schools that service can and should be part of the curriculum from freshman through senior year.

Students work closely with service-learning coaches to meet their service-learning graduation requirement. Students can earn service hours by working on a classroom service project, an after-school service project, a student club service project, or by participating in a community organization activity. All service experiences must meet an academic objective. Students may not earn service hours by working with a for-profit business or for a religious organization if the service involves proselytizing or receiving payment for their work.

Students complete pre- and post-service reflections and submit a timesheet to register their service-learning hours.¹Upon completion of each service-learning experience, students submit the timesheet, signed by a site supervisor, to the service-learning coach, who keeps track of students' hours. As part of the pre-service preparation, students write a description of the service-learning project, the partnering organization, and the importance of the problem or need their work is addressing. At the conclusion of the service-learning experience, students write an essay of one to two pages in response to thought-provoking post-service reflection questions.

Recognizing that the use of an hourly requirement to measure student participation is inadequate, the CPS Service-Learning Initiative recently introduced a set of civic outcomes to guide teachers' service-learning work.²These outcomes will help teachers to both frame and assess a service-learning project and move the district beyond a very narrow assessment of completion through the standard of 40 hours. Arne Duncan encourages this practice and clearly recognizes that service-learning can play an important role in the civic development of students. This philosophy is echoed in his statement:

It is vital that our students have the chance to learn to be citizens and leaders through service that actively engages them in the real problems of our schools and our communities. With the right programs in place, our schools can provide a wonderful opportunity for students to come together and learn the skills that will keep our democracy strong.

PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT
To promote high-quality service-learning practice, CPS adopted a pilot project strategy focused on intensive and ongoing professional development. Annual training offerings consist of a summer institute, fall symposium, and a spring conference. The range of professional development opportunities reflects the preparation, action, reflection model of service-learning. Throughout the year, the district's director of service-learning, in collaboration with a school's service-learning coach, facilitates site-based, project planning and assessment meetings.

Participating teachers typically receive a stipend for their participation in the summer institute along with popular continuing professional development units. Teacher stipends ($20/hour) end up representing the lion's share of the costs of the training, which also includes manuals, transportation, and meals. To offset costs, CPS partners with Columbia College, which donates space for the training each year.

The mix of professional development opportunities reach over 600 teachers each year. Approximately 30 teachers from 15 CPS pilot schools participate in the four-day Summer Service-Learning Institute, and 70-100 teachers participate in the fall Service-Learning Symposium. The spring service-learning conference attracts 200 teachers and is open to all schools in the district. Other teachers attend workshops at their schools, area workshops provided by district-trained faculty, or state and national conferences.

While CPS focuses most of its professional development on its teaching faculty, administrators, and staff from community organizations do participate in trainings in smaller numbers. The training sessions educate community organizations about the goals and objectives of CPS service- learning strategy. Training sessions have also been offered to build community and faculty capacity to implement specific service projects. Representatives from organizations, including the Friends of the Chicago River, the Alliance of Great Lakes, the Constitutional Rights Foundation, and Chicago Cares, present and discuss opportunities for school-community collaboration.

During the intensive four-day summer institute teachers design service-learning projects and, at semester break, participate in a mid-year follow-up training to reflect upon their experiences. To model service-learning and introduce teachers to community-based organizations, hands-on service projects with curricula connections are incorporated into the summer institute training. During one institute, teachers visited Hostelling International, a nonprofit organization that hosts international travelers. Teachers simulated the student experience by learning about the customs, politics, and geography of a chosen country, in this case Brazil, creating a display on the country, and cooking a traditional Brazilian meal for the hostel guests from around the world.

SERVICE-LEARNING SUPPORTS
To provide students with a high-quality service-learning experience while in high school is a challenge and a work in progress. CPS has found the following supports to be helpful to institutionalize high-quality service-learning:

• Funding Support.Each high school receives a base grant each year of $4 per student to support the service-learning coach position, student transportation, and supplies. Based on student population, the base grant for schools ranges from $800 to $17,000. The 40 pilot schools are eligible to apply for additional funding ranging from $4,000 to 12,000 (based on student population) to support classroom-based service-learning.
• Trainings and Technical Assistance.The service-learning initiative provides multiple opportunities over the course of each year for teachers to receive high-quality training in the pedagogy and principles of service-learning from fellow teachers and administrators. CPS has recruited and trained a cadre of school faculty to conduct workshops on service-learning, recognizing that teachers generally respond best to strategies and ideas from peers within the district. CPS also offers many networking opportunities throughout the academic year for teachers, service-learning coaches, and students to come together to share best practices, brainstorm and assess projects, and develop schoolwide implementation strategies.
• Community Partner Database.CPS has created an online database of more than 250 community organizations. CPS works closely with dozens of these organizations to develop service projects cooperatively with teachers. To become a community partner, an organization agrees to host one or more students on site and provide the stu-dents with structured and meaningful opportunities to serve their communities or with an afterschool opportunity for students to work on a service project. Partner organizations work with teachers to develop a project, create service-learning curricula, or serve as a resource or expert for a service-learning project.
• Online Curriculum.CPS has documented service-learn-ing project curriculum units in several subject areas that teachers can download for use in their classroom. Curriculum units cover the following topics: housing and homelessness, hunger and poverty, election-year action and aging, as well as the life and work of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Cesar Chavez. Additional units on adolescent health, the environment, and violence are being prepared.³
  
  These supports help CPS teachers and students complete hundreds of innovative service-learning projects each year and also ease the perception of the service-learning requirement as a burden.

LESSONS LEARNED
CPS recently completed its seventh year of the service requirement, with a more recent emphasis on service-learning. Gradually, through the transition process from com-munity service to service-learning, teachers, students, and administrators are recognizing the value of curriculum-integrated service-learning for invigorating classroom study and engaging young people in the civic affairs of their communities. Many lessons learned have emerged through these efforts. The following eight lessons offer advice to school districts interested in implementing a districtwide service-learning initiative:

Lesson #1: Service-learning at the high school level is not the most conducive entry-point for bringing service-learning to scale in a k-12 district, but don't let that dissuade you.
Moving students from class to class in 45 minute time slots is not an ideal recipe for students' deep engagement in project-oriented service-learning. The good news, however, is that teachers and students across the CPS district are figuring out ways to overcome scheduling obstacles to plan and implement valuable service-learning projects. For example, schools have funded full-time service-learning coaches or provided release time for teachers to allow for additional planning and logistical support. Schools have also developed cross-curricular projects engaging several teachers in a project. The interdisciplinary approach can be a more user-friendly entry to service-learning since it provides a supportive, collaborative environment. Perhaps form will one day follow function as districts recognize the power of integrated, active, hands-on service-learning and allow for flexible scheduling.

Lesson #2: High-quality, ongoing professional development is an essential investment to bring service-learning to scale in a district.
Districts and schools must commit time and money to provide the tools, resources and support for teachers to use service-learning effectively. In CPS, ongoing opportunities for teachers to understand service-learning, experience it in the field, and create projects with their peers have led to an impressive numbers of teachers infusing service-learning curricula into their classes.

Lesson #3: An over-reliance on hours can have negative consequences on a mandatory service-learning requirement.
CPS began its service requirement in 1998, mandating that students earn 40 service hours in order to graduate. An hourly requirement has resulted in the tendency for students and teachers to place the accumulation of hours above the quality of service. CPS is considering allowing schools to transition from an hourly requirement to a project requirement that might also be tied to a senior project requirement in some schools. Requiring projects instead of hours is both more rigorous and educationally sound. We have observed that the accumulation of hours, however, can be a motivating factor for many students to become engaged in hundreds of hours of service activities.

Lesson #4: Celebrate service-learning through incentives and recognition for faculty and students.
Public school teachers have a tendency to feel underappreciated for the challenging work that they do each day with students. A little bit of recognition can go a long way toward keeping teachers motivated and engaged. Service-learning coaches use the school newsletter to highlight both faculty and student accomplishments in service-learn-ing. CPS has been able to provide small stipends to teachers for completing service-learning projects. Although stipends do not adequately reflect the number of hours that teachers work on a project, the stipends acknowledge that their work is appreciated. In addition, the hard work of faculty and students on service-learning projects are recog-nized at special lunches and award ceremonies. Of special note is the Arne and Karen Duncan CEO Service Leader Scholarship award for two CPS students who have demonstrated outstanding academic potential and commitment to a lifetime of service and leadership.

Lesson #5: Offer multiple pathways to students and multiple entry-points for teachers to begin and complete service-learning projects.
There is no single best way to engage students in service-learning. It is a dynamic process that should be flexible enough to meet the needs of all students. Teachers need to know that there are many entry-points into a project from state learning standards or curriculum to brainstorming with students, to inviting community partners to share project ideas with students, to having a teacher articulate a passion for a particular social issue. These and other strategies have been tried and been successful in CPS.

Lesson #6: Connect service-learning whenever possible to existing or emerging educational initiatives within the district.
Service-learning stands a far better chance of being successful if it is connected to other initiatives in the district and not perceived as a stand alone. The sooner a school district embraces service-learning as a legitimate classroom teaching strategy the better. To encourage teachers to integrate service-learning into their classrooms, districts should market service-learning as a key strategy through which schools can meet student development goals and outcomes.

Lesson #7: Community partners are crucial to the development of a service-learning strategy.
Partnerships with community organizations enhance service- learning experiences significantly. Community partners bring years of experience working with specific populations and on particular issues, such as the needs of senior citizens, the environment, race relations, and housing. Bringing these partners into the fold and soliciting their input to develop service-learning projects are critical. In Chicago, community-based organizations such as the Mikva Challenge and Constitutional Rights Foundation have been extremely important partners in the transition to service-learning. The organizations help schools, teachers, and students make the link between service, civic action, and learning. The Mikva Challenge, for example, has educated students from 36 high schools on the political electoral process and provided hundreds of opportunities for students to participate in public service work.

Lesson #8: Dedicated staffing at both the school and district levels is critical to effective implementation of service-learning.
CPS has staffed a full-time position for service-learning at the district level since the inception of the service-learning requirement. The district needed a champion to push the service-learning agenda, provide resources, build relationships with communities, provide professional development, and support the work of service-learning coaches in schools. While every service-learning coach in the district would argue that the coach position should be full-time, the district has not yet allocated resources to make this happen. In the meantime, CPS has been able to generate impressive service-learning experiences with very part-time coaches.

¹ Download the CPS pre-service preparation and post-service reflection forms.[PDF]
² Download the CPS service-learning initiative's set of civic outcomes.[PDF]
³ Download the CPS Service-Learning Tool for Documentation and Sharing.[PDF]

About the Author
JON SCHMIDT has been the Service-Learning Manager in Chicago Public Schools since 2001. He is member of the board of the National Service-Learning Partnership. He can be reached at jjschmidt@cps.k12.il.us.

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