Developing Intercultural Competence through Service Learning

Too often students who study abroad are unable to adequately explain their transformational experience, nor have researchers figured out just quite how to measure transformation using a standardized scale (Savicki, 2008a). This chapter explores the outcomes of a faculty-led international service-learning course implemented at a large 4-year public institution in the southwest region of the United States. Utilizing personal inventories and the student development framework of “challenge and support,” students began to understand themselves and conversely how they come to navigate the world around them.