“Service learning is not just learning by doing, but learning by serving, with purpose and values” | Berta Paz
Service-Learning as an educational movement with an impact on institutional transformation was the central theme of the workshops organized by the Universidade Católica Portuguesa on January 30. With the participation of Berta Paz, specialist and vice president of EASLHE (European Association for Service-Learning in Higher Education), the workshops were organized in the context of the Transform4Europe Alliance (T4EU).
The first workshop, “Fundamentals of Service-Learning: understanding the pedagogy and how to start implementing it,” focused on the reasons why Service-Learning is today, for universities, more than an innovative teaching methodology, but a true educational movement with an impact on institutional transformation. As the speaker emphasized, “we are not only working with communities, but also on the transformation of universities.”
According to Berta Paz, “Service-Learning is not just learning by doing, but learning by serving, with purpose and values.” The expert also highlighted the dimension of reciprocal learning promoted by this methodology, which involves not only students, but also teachers and partner institutions in the projects.
In this regard, the specialist emphasized that “service-learning adds value to everyone—students and teachers alike—and transforms both, not in a paternalistic way, but through reciprocity.”
The second workshop, on the theme “Reimagining teaching across disciplines through Service-Learning: transdisciplinary impact and eco-social engagement,” highlighted the multiple ways of learning provided by the methodology.
Berta Paz presented an in-depth alignment between this methodology and several international reference documents, namely UNESCO's “Reimagining our Future Together” and the Council of Europe's Framework of Competences for a Democratic Culture, which emphasize the urgency of developing specific skills in students that are applicable to real contexts and civic participation. In this context, the specialist stressed that “university alliances are very well positioned to respond to societal challenges.”
A total of 45 people participated in the first workshop and 33 in the second, including professors from T4EU universities, namely Católica, Vytautas Magnus University (Lithuania), the University of Alicante (Spain), and the University of Silesia (Poland).
In line with Católica's commitment to promoting the methodology at national and international level, the workshops also reached participants from other universities and schools in Portugal, as well as from Africa and Palestine.
Universidade Católica Portuguesa's commitment to implementing Service-Learning as a hallmark will continue, with new training initiatives already planned to train teachers in this methodology. To quote Berta Paz on the relevance of this event, “it is time to shine a light on everything that has been done.”