Geography 293H: "Honors Excellence in International Service Learning"

GEOG 293H provides students with activities that integrate academic study with community service in an international context. The aim of service learning is to enrich traditional classroom-based education by getting students into a community, thereby engendering civic responsibility and simultaneously strengthening communities. GEOG 293H has five objectives: (1) to develop understanding of a set of issues in community development; (2) to learn and apply skills associated with those issues; (3) to develop and apply communication skills by speaking, writing, and/or desktop publishing; (4) to gain international experience at the community level; and (5) to reflect on personal and career interests in international development, science, the environment, public policy, or related areas. Thus, students will read, write, and talk about a set of issues of importance to a foreign community and engage in a project in that community.

The specific service-learning projects will change each semester, although some projects will be ongoing and offered multiple times. Students can take GEOG 293H in ore than one semester, to a maximum of four offerings.

Depending on the topic of the international service-learning project, GEOG 293H can complement courses in most colleges and their majors. The course is available to all Geography majors as elective credits; it is also available to all Geography Minors for credit toward the minor.

Students will be evaluated on three of the five course objectives: (1) understanding of the issues, (2) learning and application of skills, and (3) application of communication skills. Although exact procedures for determining grades will vary with instructor and service-learning project, the basis for grades will include a combination of written work, oral presentations, in-class participation, and outside-class participation.

Professor: Deryck Holdsworth