Service Learning in Engineering: A Conversation with Chris Swan

By Annie Soisson

Professor Chris Swan, Associate Professor in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, came to Tufts in the fall of 1994. Five years later, he became engaged with what is now the Jonathan M. Tisch College of Citizenship and Public Service, where he is currently an adjunct associate professor.

In 1999, Rob Hollister, now the Dean of Tisch College, offered him the support of a teaching assistant to design and deliver a course that included service learning. Swan believes that service learning is much more than simply project-based learning: He states that service learning involves four major components: an authentic project, educational objectives tied to a curriculum, connection to the community, and most importantly, a built in component of reflection.

“The course we developed involved creating knowledge on how to clean-up contaminated sites and was taken by students who were interested in this area as a career choice – mostly engineering seniors and graduate students. Once we started working with truly authentic projects, the students got intensely involved, and did more work than I actually expected!” The students kept a journal, and at the end had a post-project reflection period. Swan co-wrote a paper about the experience for the annual conference of the American Society for Engineering Education (ASEE) in 2000, and presented a poster at the conference. “From then on, I was hooked on using service-based efforts in my courses,” said Swan.

Authentic Projects Connected to the Curriculum and a Community

The following spring Professor Swan had an even bigger class, and had six or seven project sites in Boston, Medford and Somerville. One project was the Hawthorne Site in Roxbury (Boston), MA. This 2.45 acres site had been used by a variety of consumer goods manufacturers from the late 1800’s to the mid-1970’s. Abandoned in the 1980’s, the site became a prime location for illegal or “midnight” dumping. Environmental investigations found a number of contaminants including a variety of carcinogenic compounds in both soil and groundwater samples. Stakeholders involved with the site included a community group and their legal support; the owner and potential developer; an engineering consultant; and the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection. The major issue that needed to be resolved was identifying the potential end use of the site. The owner wanted to create a development with 20 homes – with a low percentage of them classified as affordable houses. The community wanted fewer homes (eight) with a significant portion of these homes being affordable.

The students were challenged with creating a design report of how to better develop the site for residential use with additional remedial measures. During the project, the students often found themselves acting as technical liaisons and advocates for the community. They reviewed the developer’s plans, provided critical input on the proposed remediation and development scheme, and developed alternative remediation designs that would enhance the health and welfare of future residents.

In fact, the presentation of the group’s findings and work led the developer to re-evaluate his proposed plan. Swan reflects, “This group had to be reminded that as engineers, you need to do more than define problems but develop solutions! They needed to figure out how to combine the expectations of the community with their own technical capabilities and project expectations. Developing solutions is key – it’s easier to get sucked into the service, and forget the learning.”

“It is easy with service-based efforts, to become immersed in what the community wants and needs. It is critical in these situations for students realize the limitations of engineering. They need to learn to think about questions like ‘Where does the financial support come from for these projects?’ All projects are multidisciplinary in nature – there are plumbing issues, electrical issues, transportation issues, and others; but there are also neighborhood wants, political ramifications, and social expectations. It’s good for students to be exposed to all of these issues because while they may have some technical expertise, it helps them understand that technical capabilities are only a part of solution development.”

“Another real-world learning point for the students working on these projects was that, as engineers, you only get pieces of information, not the whole picture. I needed to be sure that students were clear about this. Also, in real engineering, you think about questions like ‘How do I reduce risks and mitigate exposure pathways at waste sites?’ In the classroom, it is difficult to get this kind of message across.

Reflection on the Process

“Engineers, in general, aren’t interested in writing about their experiences. It’s one of the hardest things to do. So I have them tell me about the project by assigning them questions like – What was your team experience? Tell me your feelings about the project and your experience. Ideally, you would ask them to reflect again in three months and again in six months, but this is difficult in the academic program as it is currently designed.”

National Trend

Holistic learning is an exploding trend in engineering education. At Tufts there is a chapter of Engineers Without Borders – USA (EWB USA) an organization that has as a mission to serve developing communities through engineering project work. EWB-USA was founded by Bernard Amadei at the University of Colorado – Boulder and now has 250 professional and school chapters. EWB and service learning opportunities support the National Academy of Engineers (NAE) push to move forward from science for the sake of science and toward highlighting what engineering can do for society. It also furthers the agenda of the ABET and ASEE to promote holistic education in engineering.

To read more about Professor Swan’s research on Service Learning at Tufts, click here.