| Two Ohio high schools, each of which had been using service-learning for at least 10 years and was recognized for its exemplary service-learning program, participated in a multi-site case study. The purpose was to explore the possibility that successful implementation of a teaching technology such as service-learning had effected a change in the culture of each school and, further, to explain the presence or absence of change in relation to identified elements that characterize an organization's culture (values, beliefs, norms, sense of purpose, processes, behaviors, interactions, rituals, and the meaning of events) and factors that provide support for an organization's culture (administration support, adequate funding, awareness and familiarity, and faculty involvement).; Data was gathered using qualitative methods including interviews, observations, and document review. In each school, interviews were conducted with school administrator(s), service-learning coordinator(s), a sampling of teachers, students, parents, and community members. Also, specific events, activities, and documents were identified for observation and review.; Findings indicated that service-learning could change the culture of a classroom, making a difference in relationships between teachers and their students, students with other students, and students and teachers and their community sponsors and partners. However, it was not demonstrated that service-learning changed the culture of either school. For a service-learning program to effect a change in a school or district culture, it would need to be integrated across the organization and considered a normal way for a school to perform its function of teaching, to address its mission of education.; In both cases, if the school community could be envisioned as a series of concentric circles with classrooms in the center, surrounded in turn by their school, district and board, and finally by their community, the changes seen were not distributed evenly throughout the series of circles. Instead, changes could be seen in a distinct wedge extending from the service-learning classroom in the center and including the school, district, and community circles. In both cases, the service-learning wedge had its own culture that sometimes was reflected in other parts or levels of the series of concentric circles, but that nevertheless remained separate. |
