The limitations of service-learning in the Graduate School of Business: Implications brought by the COVID-19 pandemic

• Main Author: Vicente, Niku E.
• Format: text
• Published: Animo Repository 2020
• Subjects: Service learning—Philippines; Service Learning
• Online Access: https://animorepository.dlsu.edu.ph/faculty_research/8659
• Institution: De La Salle University

De La Salle University (DLSU) is recognized as the Service-Learning (SL) Hub in Asia and Oceania by the global program for the promotion of Service-Learning in the Catholic Higher Education, UNISERVITATE. The University has implemented the pedagogy for many years and is now aiming to reach higher percentages of implementation. The Service-learning implementations in the Ramon V. Del Rosario Sr. Graduate School of Business is a regular activity for most students every term. However, because of the Novel Coronavirus, the project implementers, the graduate students, faculty and the SL specialist must think of projects responsive and adaptive to the situations and challenges brought by the pandemic. The researcher used the participant observation method since he is part of the whole process of the Service- Learning implementations. This research takes a critical look at the attempted institutionalization of service learning in the Philippine University particularly in the De La Salle University. It asks whether service-learning can become deeply embedded within the university especially of that in the Graduate School Program even in this time of the pandemic; and if so, what exactly is becoming embedded. Specifically, this research suggests that there are substantial pedagogical and institutional limits to service-learning across the university. These limits, moreover, are shown to be inherent to the service-learning movement globally as the world continue to handle the communal effects brought by Novel Corona Virus. This research concludes by reframing some of the grounding assumptions of service-learning to position it as a disciplinary field more suited for becoming genuinely embedded within the graduate school program by promotion of the different types service projects.