A participatory approach to service learning in creative arts education: a win win learning opportunity for campus and community?
Service learning has been shown to be effective in preparing students to live and work in a diverse and rapidly changing society, especially when it is based on a democratic partnership between university students and community participants, resulting in mutually beneficial learning. Yet, in cases where the community is often regarded as less equal due to debilitating socio economic circumstances, there is a real danger the engagement turns into more of a charity rendering experience, rather than promoting deep learning for all involved. This article reports on our attempts to create a service learning experience that allowed students and community youth to learn with and from each other. Data were generated in four cycles of a participatory action research design, using visual, art and text based strategies. The thematic analysis indicated that the process gave participants a better understanding of each other's lived realities; that it helped to level out unequal power relations; and that the reciprocal learning boosted development on personal and professional levels. The knowledge we share in this article will help others to know how to design and implement a valuable and mutually beneficial service learning experience not only in Creative Arts education; but in any discipline where students engage with community. A Swahilli tale depicts the relationship between a monkey and a shark, a story about two creatures living in two worlds. The shark needs the heart of the monkey to give to his king who is ill and so invites the monkey on a journey with the ultimate aim of killing him, so that the king can live. The monkey agrees to go on the journey because he wants to learn and experience new things. However, the monkey finds out what the shark is planning and tricks him into taking him back to terra firma where he escapes from the shark, abruptly ending their brief relationship. Neither of them gained what they really wanted from the experience and both end up with a negative perception of the other and increased distrust. The clandestine motives of one character resulted in both parties going their separate ways with no real gain. Both were disgruntled that they had not benefitted from the relationship. 32 Journal of Education, No. 65, 2016 Often attempts to conduct community engagement result in similar outcomes due to failure to clarify motives, interests and the purpose and process of the relationship (Hall, Jackson and Tandon, 2016) Piggot Irvine (2012) calls for authentic collaboration between all partners when embarking on community engaged activities. Internationally there are calls for service learning experiences to shift from a "philanthropic" (Slamat, 2010, p.104) "paternalistic" (Butin, 2010, p.208) one sided, interventionist approach to a more collaborative one, underpinned by a dialogic relationship (Freire, 1997) that encourages communication and discovery, indispensable to knowledge and understanding on how to work together to create a more socially just society. This study thus focused on creating knowledge partnerships (Mitchell and Rautenbach, 2005) between community participants and pre service Creative Arts teachers to engage in art experiences where they could share their respective values, knowledge, and skills in order to learn from and with each other. By embedding art practices in community engagement projects, we aimed to open exchanges of mutual interest and reciprocal visions that would cause our relatively privileged, middle class students to question their accepted beliefs about the 'other' to craft a better understanding of the human commonalities between all people, regardless of their demographic background. Local knowledge is generally not foregrounded in teacher education, as we still tend to 'train' teachers to work in well resourced education contexts (Wood, 2014) By encouraging students and community youth to share art experiences towards a mutual goal, we hoped to counter the more usual approach where service is given to communities by artists (Helguera, 2011) in line with the call for new "terms of engagement" (Erasmus, 2009, p.5) between higher education and communities to foster knowledge democratization. Service learning has not been included in the formal academic program of Creative Arts education at our institution, hence the need to establish the educational benefit it might hold. The study we initiated was part of a larger interdisciplinary community project and the task for our students was to engage with community youth to aesthetically enhance a plot of land designated as a recreational area in a local township. The main questions that guided our study were: What can student and community participants learn from the process? What aspects of the engagement process enhance the attainment of mutually beneficial learning outcomes? Wood and Meyer: A participatory approach to service learning. 33 What recommendations can be made to inform the development of future service learning initiatives in Creative Arts education programs and other disciplines? We first explain how we conceptualize service learning as a transformative pedagogy, using art to foster social engagement, before outlining the research methods. We then critically discuss the emerging themes in relation to literature and what implications they have for the inclusion of service learning opportunities as an integrated educational experience in pre service teacher education programs in particular, and undergraduate programs in general. Service learning as a transformational pedagogy We draw on a critical, postmodern paradigm to understand service learning (Rogers, Luton, Biggs, Biggs, Blignaut, Choles and Tangwe, 2013) with experiential learning (Schon, 1995) as the pedagogical foundation. Experiential learning foregrounds contextualization of the learning experience and allows exploration of the relational partnerships with a view to transforming epistemologies and ontologies, accepting social responsibility and recognizing the traditional knowledge base of communities (Schon, 1995) Kolb's (Kolb and Kolb, 2005) experiential theory permits a Mode 2 teaching and learning style, where dialogical engagement is encouraged, as opposed to the transference of undisputed disciplinary 'truths' Critical theory views service learning from an anti foundational perspective (Butin, 2010) which aims to encourage questioning of norms, behaviors and assumptions. It emphasizes the political nature of education and involves a dialectical approach to problem posing within complex social systems (Freire, 1985) These theories helped us to shift service learning from the notion of 'expert help' by students towards the fostering of a democratically generated, reciprocal knowledge pool, created from the reflective dialogue between campus and community participants. All participants validated the decisions in the engagement process (Thornton, 2013) thus creating a more equal balance of power, or "democratic intimacy" (Freire, 1997, p.12) that promotes social change through relational experiences. We expressly wanted to provide our students with an opportunity to dialogue with young people of similar age, but with a very different trajectory of life 34 Journal of Education, No. 65, 2016 experiences. Unless student teachers undergo such boundary crossing pedagogical encounters, how can we expect them to be inclusive teachers who understand not only the negative influence of a poverty existence on education, but also the assets that such youth bring to the educational project? They also need to recognize and incorporate valuable local knowledge into their teaching to make it more relevant to learners' lived realities (Higher Education Quality Committee (HEQC) 2006) We need teachers who are empathic, caring and respectful of all people, who see the potential in youth rather than the problems. We used the service learning opportunity to disrupt previously held assumptions and open up a third space (Engestrom, 2001) for the generation of knowledge that will better prepare both students and community youth for professional and personal roles in this unequal and socially unjust society. Art can be used to promote social engagement between persons who would otherwise never have had the opportunity to interact. Art practices to promote social engagement The defining elements of socially engaged art (SEA) (Helguera, 2011) include group relationships and exploration of collective experiences through art based practices. Although the art itself was not the focus in the study, since neither groups were art specialists, it served as a mediating tool to encourage goal directed social interaction between two diverse groups of young people a pedagogy that can be used in any discipline. As suggested by Helguera (2011) we sought to create a convivial atmosphere to promote collaboration and participation as the participants worked together to plan, design and implement their artistic interpretation of what was needed to beautify this particular community space. SEA praxis is normally staged outside typical art environments to include 'non art' communities who are willing to engage in dialogue with others. This form of situational learning results in the generation of critical and experiential knowledge (Helguera, 2011) leading to better understanding of self and others. When university students enter complex and unfamiliar situations, social dynamics expressed through cultural codes can be misinterpreted, underestimated or ignored which results in both university and community partners feeling lost, uncertain of how to proceed or even leave them with a negative perception of the other. SEA necessitates an understanding of how interpersonal relations (e.g. power, dependence, conflict resolution, relationship building) can be Wood and Meyer: A participatory approach to service learning. 35 negotiated between the parties inv