"We found that when people from our organization who really love working with kids get involved in the program, the kids are enthusiastic and things happen very successfully," explains Warren Tausch, assessing agency buy-in within the Tillamook Bureau of Land Management.

Developing Agency Capacity

• Look for a "champion" within the organization, someone who will step forward to advance the cause of service-learning. The effective champion is well-respected by coworkers, and helps the organization to see the benefits - to both the organization and the school - of a service-learning partnership. The champion shares this vision with others, recognizes what needs to be done to bring along the organization, and motivates necessary accommodations in organizational practices and policies.
  
  
• Provide opportunities for training in service-learning to all organization or agency staff. Recognize that this will likely be a gradual process, most effective when offered in manageable segments over time.
  
  
• Encourage broad-based support for service-learning within the organization. Long-term support for the service-learning partnership relates directly to the degree of ownership that each staff member assumes - and can maintain the commitment in the event that the champion leaves the organization.
  
  
• Include the organization's Board of Directors in seeking buy-in for involvement with service-learning. As the organization considers the sustainability of its commitment, the Board may be asked to approve supportive changes in policy or strategic goals.
  

The Partnership Continuum
The relationship that makes up the partnership will adapt, as the school and the organization each becomes more committed to, and more comfortable with, service-learning practices. Each successive stage in the following continuum involves increased interaction between the partners and emphasis on the shared vision as it relates to both service and learning:

• Cooperation:
  Agency and school share information
  Low commitment, low risk
  Periodic interaction
  Roles distinct and separate
  Service site at school or agency
  
  
• Coordination:
  Agency and school meet to plan a program
  Regular contact
  Recurrent planning
  Frequent communication
  Projects may be existing or new initiatives
  
  
• Collaboration:
  Agency and school form a new structure
  Shared commitment, leadership
  Comprehensive, joint planning
  Ongoing communication
  Joint resource development, funding
  
  
• Cultivation:
  Agency and school both champion service-learning
  Intentional advocacy
  Focus on sustainability
  Shared teaching, leadership of service activity
  Outreach and training of new partners
  

Seeking to develop a long-term relationship with volunteers on a watershed restoration site, SOLV approached an advanced-level Environmental Studies class in Portland's Lincoln High School. Collaborating with the teacher to incorporate curricular goals, SOLV staff introduced the technical process of watershed restoration and the needs of the specific site to students in a series of in-class presentations. Students then planned a number of on-site activities, incorporating their learning goals into the various stages of the restoration.

On their first trip to the site, students were excited to discover an invasive plant species new to the area, known as Policeman's Helmet. Their subsequent classroom research informed them that, while not yet common to Western Oregon, Policeman's Helmet is one of the 20 most prevalent invasives globally.

Students identified the need to remove the invasive, providing a valuable service to the community. Turning service into learning, they set up a series of monitoring plots, designed to evaluate the impact of different removal techniques on this invasive, and to determine how quickly the invasive will return even if the area is over planted with native plants.

From what these students learn, they will return new benefits to the community. They will present a new understanding of how to deal with this invasive. They have also planned an informational campaign in the neighborhood around the watershed, alerting neighbors to the existence of Policeman's Helmet, and to what they are learning about its eradication. Even the very act of bringing the neighbors together for these community meetings provides a new service, building community amongst a group of neighbors who otherwise do not interact with one another.

Building Community through Service-Learning: The Role the Community Partner. A Promising Practices Issue Brief on Service-Learning by Susan (Abravanel, National Center for Learning and Citizenship (Spring 2003):Education Commission of the States (ECS)