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What Might a Historic Preservation Service-Learning Project Look Like?

Service-learning projects in historic preservation can be linked to curriculum across all grade-levels and subjects ranging from social studies, math, science, and art, to name a few. Service-learning in historic preservation should focus on student volunteers filling identified needs in ways that benefit the organization, the community, and the young people themselves.

Students can fulfill multiple curricula needs in areas such as:

  • Research
  • Documentation
  • Restoration
  • Maintenance
  • Outreach
  • Creating educational and marketing materials
Here are just a few examples of projects students could be involved in:
  • Local historical societies or house museums could use students as volunteers, while educating students on the stories of local people, places, objects, and events. Students can develop research skills by working on tasks such as searching records, surveying archaeological sites, or interviewing people to capture oral histories.
  • Students can work on archives of objects, documents, images, and other materials.
  • Restoration efforts can involve students directly, from pounding nails and painting at historic sites to trail maintenance in national, state, or local parks. Historic gardens or farms, roads and buildings, streams and military installations, as well as parks and natural features can instruct students about agriculture, transportation, industry, environment, biology, physics, chemistry, literature, writing, computer science, and other disciplines. Learning how animal and plant populations changed locally over centuries can create mental pictures or result in actual images of the way the landscape and the community evolved as human, cultural, and natural changes swept an area.
Sites can memorably reveal vast amounts of historical content:
  • How Native Americans were joined or forced out by European frontiersmen;
  • How the industrial revolution, urbanization, and emigration changed a community over the years;
  • How men and women marched off to war or served national priorities; and
  • How all these local stories and more were themes of the national epic.
Steps to Getting Started and Building Partnerships:
  1. Identify potential partners: Contact your local schools to see if there is a service-learning coordinator or program or community service efforts already in existence. If not, see if you can speak with teachers and administrators to explain your program and determine if a partnership could provide a curriculum-driven, hands-on educational opportunity that could benefit students.
  2. Identify organization or community needs: Identify historic preservation needs at your organization or in the local community and work with students and educators to see how they could fulfill those needs while meeting academic objectives.
  3. Determine individuals who will serve as primary liaisons in the planning and implementation process: These individuals should include members of the preservation organization, students, and educators.
  4. Negotiate and agree upon roles and expectations: Pledge the time to work with and understand the academic and practical needs of teachers and students who will benefit from gaining the knowledge your resource can provide. Discuss the roles and expectations for the preservation organizations, students, and schools/educators.
  5. Determine best method for on-going communication and evaluation
  6. Periodically, redesign relationships based on changing needs and circumstances

Steps to Successful Partnerships with Historic Preservation Organizations:

  1. Identify Potential Partners
    - Local/State Historic Agencies
    - Museums/Libraries
    - Tribal or Cultural Organizations
    - Cemeteries
    - Parks
    - City or County Boards
    - Nonprofit Organizations
    - Individuals
  2. Identify Needs Which are of Mutual Concern: Do a needs assessment of the community with students and agency representatives. Organize a meeting of teachers and partners and have them generate their goals for the collaboration, then have them share and identify overlapping interests.
  3. Determine Individuals Who Will Serve as Primary Liaisons in the Planning and Implementation Process: Assign student coordinators, and be sure to visit historic preservation organizations ahead of time.
  4. Negotiate and Agree Upon Desired Outcomes for: Discuss the roles and expectations for the preservation organizations, students, and schools/educators.
  5. Determine Best Method for On-Going Communication and Evaluation
  6. Periodically, Redesign Relationships Based on Changing Needs and Circumstances
Many partners begin with a low-risk project or event that establishes trust and builds momentum with an early success. Over time larger and more formal partnerships may emerge.

There is no best, one-size-fits-all model. However, partnerships work best and last the longest when each partner sees benefits in terms of what they consider important. Without a clear demonstration of mutual interest, other efforts to bolster partnerships rarely work. Furthermore, it is most effective to move beyond ad hoc, one-time partnerships towards building sustainable partnerships that continue after the projects are completed. Many people have found that it is important to keep partnerships fluid, adding new people as relationships develop. These partnerships result in better experiences for students, better community outcomes, and a richer learning experience for all those involved.