DCU colleagues attend Service Learning Week in Vienna, Austria, as part of ENGAGE Students project

As part of Engage Students project, a Service Learning Week took place in the University of Vienna, Austria, 17-21 February 2020. Professor Maria Slowey, Dr Úna Redmond, Ruth Lynam and Tanya Zubrzycki have attended on behalf of DCU.

The Service Learning Week comprised a number of keynote addresses and workshops aimed at supporting colleagues in higher education institutions who (want to) work with service-learning approaches or other similar methods to link community service with learning activities.

The first keynote address was delivered by Dr Lorraine McIlrath (NUIG, Ireland) on the topic of 'Campus Cartography - Embedding and Institutionalising Service Learning as an Ethos and Practice within Higher Education'. Dr McIlrath addressed the ethos and practice of service learning in an Irish and European context, and presented a case study on Community Knowledge Initiative (CKI) where service learning started to become institutionalised in the National University of Ireland, Galway, following the award of philantropic funding in 2004.

Another keynote on the topic of 'Academia and Social Responsibility: The Third Mission Strategy Project of the University of Vienna' was given by Barbara Schober (Austria), while keynote addresses by Ilse Schrittesser (Austria) and Katrin Kleeman (Germany) discussed partnerships between schools and the University of Vienna as well as the role of Service Learning in teacher education.

Participants have found particularly interesting several group discussions organised as part of the Winter School, topics included the foundations of Service Learning, connecting it to other concepts, involving community partners, as well as different forms of recognition of Service Learning.

Professor Slowey and Tanya Zubrzycki attended the ENGAGE Students Transnational Partner Meeting held on the second day of the Winter School.