Uniwersyteckie Czasopisma NaukoweService learning as boundary crossing in higher education pedagogy: A qualitative analysis of participants’ experiences in an interdisciplinary project
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.26881/head.2025.3.16Słowa kluczowe:
service learning, higher education, interdisciplinary cooperation, experiential educationAbstrakt
The article presents the results of a qualitative analysis of the experiences of students involved in the ARTIS project project – an interdisciplinary service learning initiative carried out jointly by the University of Gdańsk and the Academy of Fine Arts in Gdańsk, in cooperation with an industrial partner (a carpentry and furniture company) and Montessori educational institutions between October 2024 and June 2025. The empirical material was based on eight learning diaries kept by third– and fourth–year full–time students of pedagogy during the winter and summer semesters of the 2024/2025 academic year at the University of Gdańsk. The analysis, based on open coding (Charmaz), a seven–step interpretative procedure (Kvale) and the principles of thematic analysis (Braun, Clarke), identified five interrelated categories: the learning situation, combining theoretical knowledge with personal, market and social needs, perceived benefits of service learning, emerging challenges, and the logistical and organisational aspects of running the project. The results show service learning as a laboratory for cooperation and a mechanism for crossing boundaries: between theory and practice, academia and the social/market environment, as well as between the traditional roles of teacher and student. Participants report an increased sense of agency, the development of cooperation and critical reflection skills, as well as a more realistic understanding of the purpose of studying thanks to contact with real recipients and a cycle of iterative prototyping. In the discussion section, we confront the results with the literature on experiential education and the debate on the third, and potentially also the fourth and fifth missions of the university, pointing to the lack of clear definitional boundaries for missions 4 and 5, but also their heuristic usefulness for describing innovative teaching. We conclude that service learning – as applied in the ARTIS project – operationalises the third mission and can co–implement selected aspects of the fourth (knowledge translation/market relations) and fifth (innovation/social responsibility and digital transformation) missions.
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