All Posters

A case study of partnership between third level institutions and National Award Authorities.

Aidan Healy (University of Limerick)

The International Award for Young People is a self-development programme available to all 14 to 25 year olds. Launched in the UK in 1956 as The Duke of Edinburgh’s Award, the Programme has now spread to 126 countries and over 6 million young people worldwide have taken up the Award challenge. The participant is required to take on four key challenges in the areas of community involvement, personal skill, physical recreation and an adventure journey. Young people choose their own activities, set their own goals, and record their own progress. The only person they compete against is themselves, by setting personally challenging goals and achieving them.

Gaisce - the President’s Award is Ireland’s National Award Authority and was recently set up in the University of Limerick as a joint partnership with the Peer Mentoring service. This allowed the University of Limerick to promote, reward and encourage students to partake in Civic Engagement activities almost immediately with little investment.

Details of how this partnership was formed, arranged and currently operates are discussed, as well as looking at the strengths and weaknesses of such a collaboration in encouraging students to partake in Civic Engagement activities.

A Modest Policy Proposal.

Stephen Stewart (NUI Galway)

This poster follows on from a policy proposal presented to the Joint Committee on Education and Science at the Houses of the Oireachtas on the 24th of April 2008. This poster shows how disconnected the various government departments charged with ensuring equality of access to higher education have become. It focuses on barriers to education for independent mature applicants who form up to 16% of the higher education population. It highlights how a holistic integrated cross-departmental approach, is necessary to ensure an efficient delivery of positive outcomes to all parties and is the best use of public funds.

Higher education has a part to play in developing national policy in this area by examining and evaluating existing pathways to higher education. This paper suggests how very small adjustments to existing policy, can ensure savings of €60 million euro per year, which equates to 1,000 secure teacher posts in education delivery and 1,000 extra graduates, each and every year.

Considering the recent change in the economy, value for money and innovation in policy are increasingly becoming, not only necessary but vital. Government must lead this innovation and the higher education sector must play its part. With unemployment expected to reach 400,000 by the end of 2009, the higher education sector can play its part in our national recovery. Policy reform in the area of higher education access, which ensures efficiency in resource allocation by using the expertise developed in economic policy, social policy and education policy at our disposal in our universities, is the ideal holistic innovation in policy provision.

Adults, who very often have dependants of their own, are vital participants in civil society. Access to higher education for those who find themselves recently unemployed is one of the most efficient uses of public resources when alternative employment is absent. This fits squarely with government aspirations for a knowledge economy. This poster highlights how this may be attained in a cost effective manner.

This poster has been referenced in the National Plan for Equity of Access to Higher Education 2008-2013 published by the HEA; 'Modernization of Student Supports' (p50, ref 84).

Civic awareness - How important is it for healthcare graduates?

Ruth McMenamin (NUI Galway), Aoife Stack (NUI Galway), Patricia McDermott (NUI Galway), Ann Marie Plunkett (NUI Galway), Róisín Ní Chiadhra (NUI Galway)

Background: The importance of civic awareness for university students has been documented in the literature (e.g. Kelly & Miller, 2008). Civic awareness refers to a person’s inclination to be knowledgeable of and involved in the community. It also refers to the person’s commitment to act upon their sense of responsibility as a member of the community (Bringle & Hatcher, 2007). In higher education, a civically aware graduate is an individual who has completed a course of study and has the desire and ability to work with others to achieve public good (Bringle & Hatcher, 2007). Benefits of service learning include: academic knowledge and technical skills; civic awareness; diversity skills; knowledge of social issues; self-efficacy; civic behaviour; listening and communication skills; and holistic management of clients (Bringle & Hatcher, 2007).

Aims: This study aimed to investigate the importance of ‘civic awareness’ for health care graduates. Participants included speech and language therapy and occupational therapy undergraduate students who had participated in a service learning module. It is hypothesised that the skills developed through engagement in civic awareness activities would be of utmost benefit to these students as future healthcare professionals. To date, there have been no studies of this kind conducted. Thus, this study aims to fill a void in the existing literature.

Brief Methodology: A mixed methods research design involving distribution of questionnaires was used in this study. The following topics were investigated:
1. The importance of civic awareness for health care graduates.
2. The influence of civic awareness on health care professionals.

Results: Fourteen undergraduate Speech and Language therapy students and 22 undergraduate Occupational Therapy students rated the following statement: ‘Civic awareness is important for healthcare graduates’. Eighty-four percent of participants either agreed or strongly agreed that civic awareness is important for healthcare graduates. When asked how civic awareness will influence them as a health care professional in the future, respondents stated that they will:
• Approach treatment more holistically.
• Incorporate family and community in assessment and intervention.
• Inform clients of their rights and services available to them in the community.
• Be more informed and confident working on a MDT.
• Continue voluntary projects in their professional practice.

Conclusions: The above data support the findings of previous literature in this area. The results indicate that students value civic awareness and its importance to them as future healthcare graduates.

Evaluating Service Learning and Volunteering

Marilla Keating (Quality by Design), Lorraine McIlrath (NUI Galway), Lorraine Tansey (NUI Galway)

This poster gives an overview of the methodology and findings following the evaluation of service learning and volunteering in NUI Galway. The evaluation of both these initiatives was carried out by Marilla Keating of ‘Quality by Design’, an external independent facilitator for the evaluation of teaching and service provision.

NUI Galway launched a major project in 2001, entitled the Community Knowledge Initiative (CKI), which set out to underpin and realise civic mission as part of its core activities. Funding was received from Atlantic Philanthropies, the American Ireland Fund and other philanthropic sources of which commitment to evaluate the initiative formed part of the agreement.

The key aim of CKI is to place communities at the centre of debate while educating students for civic engagement. The CKI's activities were viewed as ‘integral to the University’s strategic mission and involved a fundamental examination of the role of the University in the social fabric’. This initiative was subsequently reflected as a core priority by NUI Galway’s Academic and Strategic Plan. http://www.nuigalway.ie/cki

Two of the four strands of the CKI are volunteering and service learning. (The other two are Research and Knowledge Sharing).

Volunteering (The ALIVE Programme): The key objective of the volunteering aspect of CKI is to provide opportunities and recognition for students of NUI Galway to actively ‘volunteer’ within a safe, structured, and supportive environment while developing tangible and transferable skills alongside practical volunteering experiences.

Service Learning: The key objectives of service learning in NUI Galway are as follows:
To create opportunities to integrate and relate theory to practice;
To enhance partnerships between the University and the wider community;
To increase the civic, political, academic, personal and professional capacity of students through experiental learning.

While both these initiatives encourage students to learn by active engagement with communities, the main difference for students is that service learning is linked to their academic discipline while volunteering is not.

Opinion was sought from the four main stakeholders including the students, the volunteering partners, the academic staff and the University.

The evaluation methodology included interviews, focus groups, one-to-one interviews and questionnaires. Issues such as why stakeholders got involved, the benefits, the challenges and the opportunities were explored. Students were asked about their experience and if being involved in such initiatives increased their awareness of community and encouraged them to contribute to society.

This poster outlines a general overview of the process of evaluation, the methodology and the findings.

This poster is presented in partnership with CKI.

Experiences of a volunteer co-ordinating and running a computer literacy project for young people living in disadvantaged areas of Dublin

Aidan O'Dwyer (Dublin Institute of Technology)

This contribution will report on, reflect on and evaluate the author’s experiences of co-ordinating and running, as a volunteer, a pilot computer literacy project for young people. This project was established by the Dublin Regional Council of the Society of St. Vincent de Paul in 2000, because of the perception that lack of knowledge of information technology is a new form of poverty, cutting off job opportunities and maintaining social exclusion. It was felt that though the formal educational system recognises the issue, resources were inadequate to reach all those, in the most disadvantaged areas of Dublin, who would benefit from such learning.
At the first meeting of the project steering group, the author suggested that many of the required resources were available in third level institutions. At Dublin Institute of Technology (DIT) Kevin St., good computer laboratories were free on Saturdays during the year, and each day during the July-August period. The college kindly made one such laboratory available for the project, and the first project took place over an eight-week period for two hours every Saturday morning, starting on 1 April. Nineteen 13-16 year old persons were nominated for the course, with ten ultimately participating; these persons were drawn from the south inner city community surrounding the college. Two trained ICT instructors delivered the course, with assistance, from time to time, of up to four society volunteers for further mentoring and supervision. The course covered word processing, graphics, and the use of e-mail and the Internet, with many fun elements. All safety and child protection protocols were strictly adhered to, and all insurance issues satisfied. The computer laboratory was also made available for one hour every Thursday evening for further supervised practice sessions. At the end of the project, presentations were made to the young people who completed the course, three of whom subsequently continued to work towards ECDL certification. In a review of the project, the informal college atmosphere and tutor communication skills were highly praised. A second pilot project for a younger age group, which I co-ordinated, also ran successfully in Dublin City University (DCU) from Saturday, 13 May for a number of weeks.
Following the success of the Saturday morning projects, it was decided to run a summer project, focusing on computer skills and with a sporting element, at DIT Kevin St., for six mornings in a two-week period from 10 July. In a three-hour period each morning, two hours were devoted to the computer course, followed by one hour in the swimming pool at the college. A visit to McDonalds was also arranged after two of the mornings. As before, a trained ICT instructor delivered the course, with assistance from society volunteers and a swimming instructor. Eight 13-16 year old persons participated successfully.
Though the projects were successful, it proved difficult to subsequently continue them, as their success rested on a narrow volunteer base. Full reflection and evaluation of the projects will be provided in the conference contribution; incorporating third level student service learning is a promising mechanism for a more sustainable and structured project approach in the future.

How will service learning impact your role as an SLT in training on clinical placement

Maeve McManus (NUI Galway), Sarah Crehan (NUI Galway), Angela Duggan (NUI Galway), Ciara Jones (NUI Galway), Ruth McMenamin (NUI Galway)

Background: ‘Service learning is defined as experiential (real-life) and reflective problem-based learning in which students enrolled in an academic course provide needed service to a community partner’ (Goldberg, McCormick Richburg & Wood, 2006:131). Many educators and students have identified a disconnection between the real world and academic learning. Service learning programmes have become more popular throughout the world as a method to bridge this divide (Ngai, 2006). Slattery Rashotte (2002) advocate the use of service learning as a tool for applying social knowledge in a variety of academic courses as students become active, rather than passive learners. Reflective practise is a core component of service learning, promoting processing of reactions including feeling, observing, thinking and doing (Hunt, 2007). The theory-practice gap is lessened as the practitioner can make more sense of, learn and even discover new types of knowledge that is already embedded in practice (Driscoll & Teh, 2001). There is a lack of research addressing the role of service learning in preparing health care professionals for clinical practice. This study aimed to identify how service learning will impact the role of the Speech and Language Therapist (SLT) in training on clinical placement.

Methodology: A questionnaire was distributed to 22 undergraduate SLTs in training currently partaking in a service learning module, The Aphasia Outreach Programme. This programme aims to provide an opportunity to share their knowledge/resources with people, living with aphasia (Community Knowledge Initiative, 2006). Prior to the commencement of the programme SLTs in training attend a workshop in preparation for their visits. Training in the use of interactional techniques, conversational strategies that conversation participants employ to organise and make sense of the conversation, is provided (Atkinson & Heritage, 1994, cited in Oelschlaeger, 1999). This study investigated students perceptions of the impact service learning will have on their clinical placements.

Results: The results of each question were collated. The data was analysed qualitatively and common themes identified. From the results it is evident that the benefits of service learning for clinical placement include not only the development of practical skills such as employing strategies for supportive communication, but also personal gains such as confidence levels when working with this client group.

Discussion/conclusions: These results indicate that the majority of SLTs in training consider service learning as a beneficial experience and that the resultant learning will be of considerable use on their clinical placements. However, 6% of the participants did not recognise the benefits of service learning to clinical placement. As Reed et al. (2005) states, service learning, even of short duration can have a positive impact in the lives of students.

Irish Higher Education Student Volunteering Matrix

Lorraine Tansey (NUI Galway), Orlaith McGourty (University College Dublin)

Volunteering has long been part of the student experience in higher education. Increasingly higher education is taking an active role in coordinating and facilitating student community engagement, undoubtedly for its perceived student development benefit. “Participation in volunteering and social action produces benefits in the development of greater confidence, team-working and communication skills and greater awareness of community and diversity” (Gaskin, 2004).

The aim of the poster is to create a matrix of information relating to the voluntary activity of students across higher education institutions. The snapshot will offer a comprehensive view of the breadth of activities that takes place both off and on campus, such as societies, mentoring and community engagement, as well as the institutional support for voluntary activity.

The researchers will carry out phone interviews with key personnel to ascertain a number of matrix components. The matrix’s components will be determined by a literature review of international higher education volunteer initiatives and include such aspects as: volunteer awards, dedicated support personnel, volunteer training, context and scale of activity. The matrix will illustrate the interview responses of thirty-one institutions across the island of Ireland including:

Queens University Belfast,
University of Ulster,
Dublin City University,
University College Dublin,
University of Limerick,
Trinity College Dublin,
University College Cork,
NUI Galway
NUI Maynooth
Royal College of Surgeons
Dublin Institute of Technology,
Limerick Institute of Technology,
Waterford Institute of Technology,
Dundalk Institute of Technology,
Carlow Institute of Technology,
Athlone Institute of Technology,
Sligo Institute of Technology,
Galway-Mayo Institute of Technology,
Institute of Technology, Tralee,
Tallaght Institute of Technology,
Letterkenny Institute of Technology,
Institute of Technology, Blanchardstown
Dun Laoghaire Institute of Art, Design & Technology,
National College of Art & Design,
National College of Ireland,
Tipperary Institute,
Marino Institute of Education,
Froebel College of Education,
Mary Immaculate College,
St. Angela’s College,
St. Patrick’s College.

The poster will offer an overview of the spectrum of volunteering activity in Ireland currently. The resulting matrix will enable information sharing, networking and a basis to develop future opportunities for collaboration. The matrix will also assess the viability of a national award for student volunteering.

References
Gaskin, Katharine. (2004). Young People, Volunteering and Civic Service: A Review of the Literature. UK: Institute for Volunteering Research.

Mapping Student Volunteering at NUI Galway

Lorraine Tansey (NUI Galway)

A goal of the Community Knowledge Initiative (CKI) is to enable NUI Galway to become a role model in promoting the development of civic and leadership skills in students. To this end a student volunteering programme, entitled ALIVE (A Learning Initiative and the Volunteering Experience), was established by the CKI to harness, acknowledge and support the contribution that NUI Galway students make by volunteering. The ALIVE programme aims to:

• Increase the academic, personal and professional capacity of students through volunteering;
• Enhance partnerships between the University and the wider community through provision of a supportive environment in which students and community can liaise;
• Harness and promote volunteering on and off campus through public recognition of the commitment made by students to their communities.

Established in September 2003, over 1700 students have been recognised to date for their volunteering commitment within a variety of pathways including work with over forty community and non-governmental organisations, participation within societies and clubs, mentoring first year students, etc. The ALIVE Certificate for Volunteering is awarded to students for volunteering with the community, whether that is the university community or within the wider national or international community. This academic year over 1,300 students have registered an interest in the programme and signed-up to volunteer with our sixty community partners. ALIVE is the first ever student volunteer programme to be embedded within an institution of higher education in Ireland.

The aim of the poster is to offer a visual mapping of the breadth of volunteering activities recognised as well as the infrastructural support at NUI Galway. Using mind-mapping software a diagram of the ALIVE programme will illustrate the collaboration of staff, students and community. Drawing on a rich history of student involvement, NUI Galway has taken a unique approach to supporting all types of student volunteering and building on the sense of community. The mapping will demonstrate the collaborative institution-wide approach to student engagement.

Measuring Civic Thinking and Critical Thinking in a Nationally Recognized Civic Engagement Program

Daniel Stuckart (Wagner College)

Abstract
This proposal is for a poster session to present the results of a two-year effort to create assessment instruments to measure civic and critical thinking in an experiential learning program at Wagner College in Staten Island, a borough of New York City. The assessment instruments are critical for directing policy (Theme 3) and sustaining the College-community organization partnerships (Theme 4). Wagner College is a small, practical liberal arts institution with a national reputation for civic engagement. In 2008, The U.S. President’s Higher Education Community Service Honor Roll recognized Wagner College with distinction for its innovative community partnerships. As part of a three-year $550,000 Learn and Serve grant, Wagner College developed close relationships with several partners, including a high-needs, diverse elementary school and an organization which provides services to homeless and poor community members. Six of the College’s academic departments created learning communities specific to the needs of the partner organizations and the disadvantaged youths they serve. Over 1,200 Wagner students have participated in the program, which has served approximately 8,000 local youths. Every Wagner College student is required to join a learning community in the freshman, sophomore or junior, and senior years. One of the challenges of evaluating the effectiveness of the learning communities was developing assessments for the goals of fostering civic thinking and critical thinking. Adopting an instrument developed by the College’s science department with the aid of a National Science Foundation grant, the civic engagement faculty utilized a pre- and post-test assessment design using a seven-point scale along the two measures, civic and critical thinking. The poster session will present the instruments, the rationale for them in the context of civic engagement, preliminary results of the study and corroborating qualitative data. Moreover, preliminary results have already guided policy decisions to concentrate efforts in a particularly troubled area of Staten Island.

Occupational Therapy to promote independent living in the context of a continuing care service for homeless people - A case study

Linda Connell (NUI Galway), Neifinn Ni Dhufai Boltuin (NUI Galway), Ashleigh Waldron (NUI Galway), Margaret McGrath (NUI Galway)

Introduction:
There are an estimated 5-6,000 homeless people in Ireland (Simon Community, 2007). The Galway Simon Community aims to ensure that ‘any person who is homeless or at risk of homelessness is given every opportunity to realise their potential to live a fulfilled life in an appropriate home of their own’ (Galway Simon 2005). In 2008 we partnered with Galway Simon’s Continuing Care project to provide occupational therapy input for individuals transitioning form sheltered accommodation to independent living. This paper reports on occupational therapy intervention with one such client.

Methods:
Client A is a 56 year old man with a long history of homelessness. He presents with significant memory impairment and reduced functional status which limits his ability to independently complete activities of daily living. Client A has recently transitioned into independent living.

Over a period of 24 weeks we provided one-on-one occupational therapy intervention to address Client A’s occupational performance needs. Therapy sessions were provided on a weekly basis by student occupational therapists from the National University of Ireland, Galway with supervision from academic staff.

Outcomes:
Outcomes of occupational therapy intervention will be evaluated using (i) Occupational Self Assessment Tool (Kielhofner, 2003) (ii) Cognitive Failures Questionnaire (Broadbent et al., 1982). Pre- and post-intervention results will be presented and the challenges of working in this type of service will be discussed.

Participatory Research and Action: Immigrants, Civic Participation and Lifelong Learning - a European Curriculum

Caitriona Stewart Short (NUI Galway)

Immigrant Inclusion and Civic Participation has been recognised as a crucial issue for democracy in the European Union.

The EU Grundtvig Project ‘Winning Immigrants as Active Participants’ is a curriculum design project, based on adult teaching and learning methodologies, for immigrant adults who are under-represented in political parties and trades unions.

The Irish component of the Project is concerned with designing workshops and modules on ‘Immigrant Participation in Political Parties’, both country specific to Ireland and for use by political party activists and adult educators across Europe.

The courses aim to stimulate the demand for learning among immigrant adults who are under-represented in life-long learning.

Participatory Research and Action (PRA) is an approach and a set of tools for helping groups of people to identify their own issues or problems, work out options for handling them, create an action plan and organize to carry out the plan.

The Poster will illustrate the use of PRA as a methodology in a group enquiry system, where immigrants discussed their experiences of civic participation in Ireland and accessing politicians and the political process. It identifies issues to be addressed when designing training courses for adult immigrants in civic participation.

Since the Project has just concluded, there are opportunities to consider further dissemination networks and research. In particular the Project outcomes may suggest pathways to set up a Communities of Practice model, to enable the institutional embedding of such projects in civic engagement partnerships within the University.

Students & Academic Staffs' Perceptions of the Value of Service Learning in the Undergraduate Curriculum

Ruth McMenamin (NUI Galway), Olivia Ward (NUI Galway), Ciara Skehan (NUI Galway), Sarah Keegan (NUI Galway), Stephaine Moore (NUI Galway), Cathriona Hanmore (NUI Galway)

This poster demonstrates the value of service learning modules and the role of the third-level institution in helping to turn students into active participating citizens as well as productive memebers of the workforce. It highlights the opportunities for creating opportunities for educational activities that take place within the formal curriculum. The poster exposes the barriers and opportunities that are faced by both students and academic staff alike, when embedding the use of service learning. Service learning is a form of experiential education characterized by hands-on community involvement that is integrated with the academic curriculum (Piper, DeYoung & Lamsam, 2000). Evidence suggests students learn best when engaged in co-constructing knowledge, testing acquired knowledge against real-life experiences to challenge their own assumptions and learning through their civic involvement (Mpofu, 2007). Although supporters of service learning can discuss its value, faculty and administrators want empirical evidence to support the claims of its usefulness or value (Astin, Vogelgesang, Ikeda & Yee, 2000). This study aimed to explore what the perceptions of students and academic staff in the School of Health Sciences towards the value of service learning in the undergraduate curriculum in National College of Ireland, Galway.
A qualitative approach was taken through the use of an open-ended questionnaire and interview topic guide. Speech and Language Therapists-in-training participating in an Aphasia Outreach module carried out this research.
Data was gathered from thirty health sciences students who were participating in two separate service learning modules. Responses from the questionnaires were coded using grounded theory. Interviews were carried out with four members of academic staff (3 co-ordinators of the service learning modules within health sciences and one representative of the Community Knowledge Initiative involved in service learning). Interviews were transcribed and coded. All data was stored confidentially.
The results in our study concur with those already present in the literature. Academic staff believed that service learning when integrated into the undergraduate curriculum promoted a sense of community as it promotes awareness of the challenges that people with disabilities face. They also believed that service learning facilitated the transfer of theory into practice commenting that ‘it completes the learning that cannot be taught in a lecture’. This highlights the importance of developing service learning as a pedagogy. It was viewed by academic staff as an equalitarian pedagogy as opposed to authoritarian. Staff also commented on the challenges in creating a service learning programme.
From the students’ perspective, they believe this different approach to teaching facilitated personal and academic gains by providing them with valuable insight. Examples include insight into the daily challenges faced by the members of the community with whom they worked as well as gaining a greater respect for community involvement. Students consistently reported a sense of duty for “giving something back“to the community and reciprocal learning that occurred in the naturalistic environment. It emerged that students felt service learning had shaped their professional skills and prepared them for clinical placement. The benefits of service learning are perceived to significantly outweigh the challenges that service learning may present.

Teaching and learning in the Community: Service Learning in Italian at NUI Galway.

Anne O'Connor (NUI Galway)

This poster will look at the case study of the Service Learning Initiative in the Department of Italian, NUI Galway. This module teaches university students about language acquisition and language teaching methodologies before arranging for them to teach introductory classes in Italian in local primary schools. During the placement in the schools, the students develop a teaching portfolio and reflect on the experience of community based learning. Due to the nature of the practical work, there is a strong emphasis on language acquisition through fun and games. Primary school pupils see that language learning can be fun and learn about a new culture and language. At the end of the Italian course, the pupils come to the university for ‘Italian Day’ during which they are presented with a certificate to mark their achievement in learning Italian. The module is for final year students and the course was awarded the prestigious European Language Label in 2007 for excellence and originality in language teaching. This initiative aims to foster positive attitudes towards language learning in the university and in the community, while also helping local schools develop and sustain a foreign language curriculum. There are many benefits to this type of course:
• The university student benefits by learning about language acquisition, gaining practical teaching experience and also enhanced community involvement.
• Primary school children benefit from increased exposure to modern languages.
• The university benefits from increased links with the community and the language department benefits from an enhanced profile of modern languages within schools.

The poster will focus on:

• The organisational cycle of the course (including challenges and problems).
• Student reaction to the course (feedback, concerns, difficulties, highlights).
• Evidence of enhanced engagement through the course.
• Reflective learning in community based learning (teaching portfolios and reflection).

The effects of different types of service-learning activities on pre-service teacher efficacy

Trae Stewart (University of Central Florida), Kay Allen (University of Central Florida)

This poster will address the “Practice” theme of the conference. The poster will comment on creating and developing pedagogies for civic engagement by engaging pre-service teachers in K-12-based service-learning experiences. Impact will be determined through comparative changes in teacher efficacy as distinguished by engagement in two distinct service activities.

Teacher efficacy refers to a teacher’s judgment of his or her competence and ability to bring about meaningful and significant educational outcomes for all students (Amor et al., 1976; Bandura, 1977; Tschannen-Moran & Woolfolk-Hoy, 2001; Tschannen-Moran & Woolfolk-Hoy, Hoy, 1998). Evidence is mounting that teacher efficacy has an impact on numerous desirable educational outcomes including student achievement, motivation, and the students’ own sense of efficacy (Tschannen-Moran & Woolfolk-Hoy, 2001). Findings suggest that teachers with a high sense of efficacy are less likely to interact negatively with students (Soodak & Podell, 1993) and to experience burn-out (Burley, Hall, Villeme, & Brockmeier, 1991). Some studies have found evidence that the collective efficacy of a faculty can be a stronger predictor of student achievement than the socio-economic level of the students (Bandura, 1993; Goddard, Hoy & Woolfolk- Hoy, 2000). Researchers including Hoy and Woolfolk (1990) and Woolfolk-Hoy and Spero (2005) suggest that more information is needed concerning the factors and experiences that contribute to efficacy judgments and how efficacy beliefs are established.

While engagement in community service activities has been associated with increases in self-efficacy in high school students (Crosman, 1989; Marks, 1994), most documentation has been on the connection between increased self-efficacy and volunteering during the undergraduate years (Astin, Sax, & Avalos, 1999; Schmidt, 2000; Takahashi, 1991; Taylor & Trepanier-Street, 2007; Teranishi, 2007). Service-learning participation has not been shown to conclusively affect general self-efficacy (Billig, 2000; Furco 2003; Ikeda, 1999; McMahon, 1998; Morgan & Streb, 1999; Shaffer, 1993). Miller (1997) found that undergraduate students who participated in a service-learning course with different service options showed no increase in their efficacy to impact the world. In the same vein, special education students demonstrated no significant change in self-efficacy after participating in service-learning (Healy, 2000). Furthermore, a major study out of the University of California - Los Angeles concluded that undergraduates who had participated in service-learning did not report significant changes in self-efficacy unless they were simultaneously participating in generic community service (Vogelgesang & Astin, 2000).

Service-learning shows promise in increasing perceived self-efficacy. However, findings remain inconclusive about the direct role that service-learning may have independent of simultaneous volunteer activities. And, there is a lack of research overall on the impact of service-learning on pre-service teachers’ sense of teacher efficacy. With this in mind, the current study aims to examine the impact of participation in service-learning in K-12 classrooms on pre-service teachers’ sense of teacher efficacy and whether the type of service project plays a role in these outcomes.

This study will report on findings from a quasi-experimental, comparison study between two different education courses that required service-learning in a large south-east university in the U.S. over the 2008 spring, summer, and fall semesters. Class 1 was a general methods and classroom management course (110 students). Class 2 was an educational psychology class (90 students). Class 1 students were to assist the host K-12 teacher in any way s/he needed, deliver a lesson and get feedback from the host teacher, and focus one analytic assignment on classroom management. Class 2 students were to tutor individual students or small groups of students. Class 2 students were required to chart the human development of students with whom they worked. No work with the whole K-12 class was part of the Class 2 requirement, only individual tutoring or small group work.

Students completed demographic questionnaires and pre/post versions of the Teachers’ Sense of Efficacy Scale (Tschannel-Moran & Woolfolk Hoy, 2001). Analyses will report demographic data, paired-samples t-tests evidencing significance in pre- and post-survey aggregate means within groups, and MANOVA/MANCOVA statistics to show relationships between groups’ survey scores and across demographic variables, respectively.

User Forum: Who Cares for Older Citizens in the West of Ireland?

Claire Welford (NUI Galway), Cathy Bailey (NUI Galway)

This poster presents the process of undertaking a “User Forum” research project with older people in the West of Ireland. The Irish Centre for Social Gerontology in collaboration with the School of Nursing & Midwifery, National University of Ireland, Galway and under the guidance of Professor Marian Barnes (Professor of Social Policy, University of Brighton) aimed to answer the question: "Who Cares for Older Citizens in the West of Ireland?” The research adopted a citizen jury or user forum approach. This consisted of 15 older people, an Advisory Group of 12 professionals and independents who have working knowledge of, or interest in, local services for older citizens and four expert witnesses (people with experience and specialist understanding of a service) who were called by the forum in order to learn more about the issues raised and discussed. The project highlighted the numerous challenges in relation to recruiting older people to research; however it also revealed their pleasure at being included and asked about their opinions on issues relating to them. Their excitement at merely being in the University was clearly evident. Many outcomes were achieved including plans for the University to include more inter-generational projects on the curricula, involvement of older people in campus radio and recognition of the need to continue to reach out to the older community. This project highlights the “push and pull” of partnership – higher education as a community resource and community as a higher education resource. It reflects on the challenges Universities face in creating sustainable civic engagement partnerships and ways of addressing these challenges.

What people with aphasia and their caregivers think about the conversation partner programme

Ruth McMenamin (NUI Galway), Siobhan Keohane (NUI Galway), Anita McLoughlin (NUI Galway), Colette Gill (NUI Galway), Orla Montague (NUI Galway)

Conversation and communication is an important part of psychosocial wellbeing for the person (Livneh & Antonak, 1997). The Conversation Partner Programme (CPP) aims to facilitate understanding of the nature and role of conversation in a community-based context. The CPP is built on the same philosophy as Campus Engage, providing individuals in higher education with an opportunity to engage in community-based learning. This programme educated Speech and Language Therapy students from NUI Galway about the importance of developing strategies to enable people with aphasia to participate in conversation. It is critical that Speech and Language therapy students learn about the lived experience of aphasia and apply the theoretical knowledge they have acquired in a community environment. Furthermore, it enabled students to actively reflect on their experiences, which is a fundamental skill in future practice. The CPP is a support mechanism for volunteers who visit people with aphasia (McVicker, Parr, Pound, & Duchan, 2007).

In 2003, Rayner and Marshall demonstrated that volunteers benefit from training courses that improve their conversation skills when talking with people with aphasia. Kagan, Black, Duchan, Simmons-Mackie, and Square (2001) demonstrated that with training, the communication skills of both the person with aphasia and their partner can promote effective communication. McVicker et al. (2007) found that training volunteers in communication increases communicational opportunities for people with aphasia. It also acts as an intervention approach which promotes long-term functional gains for the person with aphasia and their carer. A wide range of views were investigated which adds weight to this study. Conclusions from these studies indicate that an intervention approach such as the CPP may provide a viable, long-term, functional means of intervention for people with aphasia.

This study is a cross-sectional, qualitative study, investigating attitudes of clients and their carers towards the CPP. Nine conversation partners and seven carers were surveyed. Participants were included if they were taking part in the CPP. Individuals with aphasia and their carers were given questionnaires. Nine of 12 questionnaires given to people with aphasia were returned (75% response rate). Eight of nine questionnaires given to the carers were returned (89% response rate). Data were analysed descriptively with frequencies, which are represented in bar chart format. Analysis by qualitative coding was also employed.

The carers reported a positive experience of this programme, citing it as ‘helpful and very good’. Simultaneously, they found the programme beneficial reporting it as ‘Very good to have contact and conversation with the outside world, particularly with young people’. Furthermore, three carers said they would not change anything about the CPP. Seven people with aphasia found it easier to have a conversation with the students in comparison to talking with other people. One conversation partner reported the conversation was no different, whilst one said sometimes it was easier. Although the sample size for this study was small, the results indicate positive outcomes from the experience. The central theme to emerge from this research was that the programme was valuable. Overall, the research has demonstrated that the CPP was a positive experience for people with aphasia and their carers.