The Influence of Service Learning on Students' Personal and Social Development

Abstract. An explanatory methods design was used to evaluate the influence of a service learning course on learning, personal, and social outcomes for service learning (n = 142) students. These students showed improvements in diversity and political awareness, community self-efficacy, and civic engagement scores from the beginning to the end of the semester. In addition, the students' academic learning, personal and interpersonal development, and community engagement were detected as the major benefits from engaging in service learning. The findings of this study suggest that service learning contributes to students' academic learning and personal and social development through social-emotional processes.