American Political Science Association Teaching and Learning Conference
Track 6: Service-learning: Session A, February 19, 2005
Advancing Undergraduate Service-Learning and Community-Based Research at a
Large Public Research University: The University of Wisconsin-Madison’s
Morgridge Center for Public Service
Mary K. Rouse and Virginia Sapiro
1
University of Wisconsin - Madison
“Engagement” has become one of the ubiquitous buzz words in discussions of the
goals and strategies of undergraduate education today. Colleges and universities across
the country as well as higher education associations declare citizenship and engagement
part of the goals of their educational missions. Although many different strategies have
been proposed to pursue inculcation of habits of mind and practice that support
engagement, the integration of service- learning and community-based research into the
undergraduate curriculum is one of the widely-accepted approaches, at least in concept.
2
Although increasing resources are available on the national level to assist the
development of service- learning courses and curricula, such as those made available
through the National Service- Learning Clearing House
3
and the Campus Compact,
4
what
kind of institutional organization and support is necessary on the campus level? We offer
a case study of the institutional support available at one major research-extensive public
university, the University of Wisconsin – Madison, to explore some of the questions,
problems, and practices.
The Tasks of Campus -Based Institutional Support
Service- learning has vocal advocates and practitioners on hundreds of campuses,
but strong institutional support is necessary to make sure its promise is fulfilled in reality.
The institutional support must be aimed at accomplishing a number of tasks, including
making sure that service- learning is (1) part of the understood and accepted models of
pedagogy, both generally and within particular disciplines, interdisciplinary areas and
gradually among the separate academic schools and colleges; (2) a pedagogical practice
that is supported adequately to allow faculty to pursue it without undue added burdens to
1
Mary K. Rouse is Director of the Morgridge Center for Public Service and Assistant Vice Chancellor of
the University of Wisconsin – Madison; Virginia Sapiro is the Sophonisba P. Breckinridge Professor of
Political Science and Women’s Studies and Associate Vice Chancellor for Teaching and Learning. We
welcome all comments and suggestions for revision; please address these to Sapiro at
## email not listed ##
.
Questions about the Morgridge Center and its programs can be addressed to Rouse at
## email not listed ##
,
Sapiro, or Morgridge Center Assistant Director Randy Wallar,
## email not listed ##
. We are
grateful to the many students, faculty, staff, and community participants who made it worth it to write this
paper.
2
Throughout this paper when we reference service-learning, we are including community-based research as
part of that concept. Moreover, we are always referring here to academic service-learning.
3
http://www.servicelearning.org/index.php
4
http://www.compact.org/
Page 1 of 20 
Convention