A student bringing food into Charlie's Cupboard food pantry.

Service Learning

Bridge your classroom learning to community engagement. Service learning is a form of experiential education that enhances learning and development through meaningful engagement in the community, in-depth educational exploration in real-world contexts, and intentional reflection.

Through the Office of Service Learning (OSL), USD offers opportunities for Service-Learning. Connecting academic work to community-based activities to addresses significant needs, the goal is to encourage students to become life-long active citizens. Students can get acquainted with community engagement through the student lead Alternative Week of Off-Campus Learning (AWOL) program by:

  • Participating in weekend experiences or week-long excursions
  • Signing up to volunteer with one of our many community partners
  • registering for a course that offers a Service-Learning component.

For more information about community-based projects and research, reach out to engage@usd.edu.

Service learning success

Jesse Sullivan and his AWOL group in Houston for an event.
I joined AWOL looking for a volunteer experience, but I got so much more than that. I build relationships with other students because AWOL brings together selfless people that want to do good in the community.

Jessie Sullivan

B.S. Chemistry '22
Albion, Nebraska

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