RECIPROCAL BENEFITS OF STUDENT SERVICE-LEARNING IN

ADDRESSING THE NEEDS OF HERITAGE LANDSCAPES

Cecilia Rusnak
Department of Landscape Architecture, Penn State University,
University Park, Pennsylvania, USA
Brian Orland
Department of Landscape Architecture, Penn State University,
University Park, Pennsylvania, USA
Jan Hendrych
Silva Tarouca Research Institute for Landscape and Gardening,
Pruhonice, Czech Republic

INTRODUCTION

The Cesky Raj (Bohemian Paradise) region in the northern Czech Republic has drawn
tourists for nearly two centuries. Its main attractions are its “rock cities,” sandstone cliffs
and other land forms such as caves, tunnels, and rock windows associated with sandstone
forms. However, it is also a landscape with medieval castle ruins, chateaux, and
traditional Bohemian villages. While proposed for inscription on the World Heritage List
as a natural property, the management plan for this Czech Protected Landscape Area
targets both cultural and natural resources for protection.

The challenge for The Administration of Protected Landscape Areas of the Czech
Republic is that management practices cannot be implemented until land use plans for
local communities and sites are drawn and approved. Given the unpredictable subsidies
for planning activities, completion of each community plan is uncertain—there are
limited governmental resources for this task. Where in other settings community-based
action would fill this planning void, in the Czech Republic the many years of centralized
planning under Communist rule have led to an environment where few have the skills to
organize citizens in collective and collaborative planning, and citizens are uncertain about
how to systematically collect and use information to achieve planning goals.

A liaison between The Administration and the Department of Landscape Architecture at

Penn State University is helping to advance this planning process. In the summer of
2003, graduate students worked with the Administration to develop landscape and visual
character analyses for two sites within the Cesky Raj Protected Landscape Area. This
activity is an important first step toward creating workable land use and management
plans, and such a liaison--between a State agency and University--may provide a model
for assisting emerging countries in their goals for protecting heritage landscapes and at
the same time meeting educational goals.
 Cesky Raj landscape viewed from Trosky Castle

PEDAGOGY AND SERVICE LEARNING

“The task of a University is to weld together imagination and experience”

Alfred North Whitehead, 1929.

Whitehead talked of the necessity that society be affected by the works of the University,
and, by extension, of the necessity that students learn through practical experience. He
was echoing the words of John Dewey (1916), noting the importance not only of action
and experience but also of reflection on those experiences as parts of the thinking
process. He notes the importance of this especially in a world that is constantly
changing—very much the condition that Landscape Architectural Historic Preservation
addresses daily.

The convictions of these scholars have been built upon by subsequent writers and
educators so that the beliefs are now widespread that active and engaged learning styles
are beneficial and that direct experience of the world through service learning and action
research activities is not only a tool toward learning but a necessity for development of
the complete citizen-student (Light, 2000; Orr, 1994.) Service learning, as practiced
currently, includes the engagement of students and faculty with real community problems
and issues, and reciprocal community involvement in study, learning, and problem-
solving activities. The approach balances student learning and community assistance. In
addition to learning skills directly related to the community experience, students are
asked to reflect on such experiences during and after their terms of involvement.

The professional fields have always enjoyed an advantage as educational settings in that
their focus is by its nature on application of knowledge. Landscape Architecture with
colleagues in Urban Planning and, to a lesser degree, Architecture has increasingly
expanded its area of application beyond the rural landscape to include urban or
community landscapes. The pedagogical value of posing design problems in the real-
world settings of inner-city or depressed rural communities has been matched by the
willingness, often enthusiasm, of those communities to be the location of studies.
Frequently led by student enthusiasm, there has been a genuine interest from community
participants in learning about their own settings and the mechanisms by which positive
change may arise. The idea of Service Learning, learning by participating as espoused by
Dewey and Whitehead, has been joined by Action Research, joint processes of learning
as described by Paolo Freire (1993) and more lately Barbara Jacoby and Associates
(1996.) Through learning side-by-side, citizens and students not only learn about what
needs to be done but by necessity learn how to motivate and mobilize change. Ideally,
service–learning builds knowledge and encourages the development of personal, social,
and cognitive abilities. It results in productive student-faculty learning and teaching
interactions, and enhanced communication and critical thinking skills.

Pedagogically and as a vehicle for social empowerment the results have been compelling.
In communities world-wide disenfranchised populations have now become vehicles for
positive change. Student bodies once feared to have lost interest in less-advantaged
social classes have embraced work for not-for-profit agencies working to solve the most
intransigent mixes of urban and rural community decline and lost confidence (Reardon,
1999.) Landscapes with significant cultural and historical roots can provide particularly
compelling subjects for student and community learning.

Study Abroad as a Service Learning Vehicle

The Landscape Architecture and Architecture programs at Penn State collaborate in the
Sede di Roma program, a residential study-abroad program for advanced undergraduate
students housed in central Rome. Students take classes in Urban Form and Structure, and
Urban Design, as well as traveling extensively. However, the maturity of that urban
setting offers few chances for intervention, so that opportunities for engaged service have
been few. By contrast three of the areas of specialization of our department—Historic
Landscape Studies, Watershed Stewardship, and Community Design Assistance—focus
on study of the issues and concerns of the rapidly changing rural communities in
Pennsylvania and intervention in the form of planning and design studies.

A chance conversation led to discovery of the Central European Linkage Program, CELP,
an outreach initiative of the Heinz Endowments and professionals in the Pittsburgh area
willing to apply their skills to the unique problems of the emerging economies of Poland,
Slovakia and the Czech Republic. While CELP’s focus in the Czech Republic was on
bringing community design processes to bear on the problems of communities that had
long been denied design and planning services, almost without exception those locations
were rich cultural and historical repositories balancing the need to change with the times
with strongly felt needs to preserve and restore their heritage settings.
Through organizations such as Nadace Via, a community enabling organization, and
individuals such as Jan Hendrych, of the Silva Tarouca Research Institute for
Landscapes, we identified ways to bring the skills of our students to bear on the wide
range of complex issues that face Czech communities. Given the strong interest in
historic preservation in the Czech Republic it became clear that landscape historic
preservation would be a strong focus for ideas exchange. The opportunity for our
students to practice professional tasks and to become immersed in the issues of problem
solving in an unfamiliar and changing setting would enable us to achieve a focus on
active learning impossible to achieve in a campus-based academic class alongside
competing classes, social schedules and other distractions. Furthermore, we could
implement a service-learning model of immersion in active work with community-based
problems, followed by structured reflection, again something rarely feasible in curricula
divided into compartmentalized classes.

Students and professionals viewing site from Klokocske Scaly rock formation

Case Study in the Czech Republic

Eight students self-selected to participate in the Czech program. They brought with them
an array of skills that complemented each other, making the overall experience a very
fruitful one in terms of both production and interpersonal relations. Using a team
approach to problem-solving, a model frequently and successfully used in landscape
architecture courses at Penn State, project ideas were more fully considered than if the
students had worked as individuals.

The community component of the service-learning experience was multidimensional.

Two landscapes were studied, one in an intensive workshop situation where a proposed
planning approach was crafted in only two days. In this case the “community” consisted
of professionals seeking advice on land use and landscape management. The second
landscape was studied over a longer term—three weeks—and here there were two
communities: one was a group of professionals with whom the students had frequent
interactions, the other a community of residents.

Castle Humprect in the town of Sobotka was the short term project. Castle managers
sought principles for a specialized management plan for the forest surrounding the site.
Such a plan was necessary to defuse a conflict of interest between the foresters’
production practices, protection of the historic monument, and conservation of nature and
historic landscape character.

A second study site was situated in a designated protected buffer zone, a valley just
adjacent to the Klokocske Scaly rock formation, and included the villages of Klokoci and
Rotstejn. The villages still maintain a traditional appearance with an organic settlement
pattern and older architectural styles. The more inclusive landscape of fields and
orchards, while picturesque, is reminiscent of communist rule when long-established strip
fields were consolidated into larger shared land holdings. However, the absence of any
land use plan and a desire for growth led the village of Klokoci to approve unrestricted
development that contrasted with the natural and cultural landscape values protected in
adjacent lands. Increased tourism and community growth are exacting pressure on the
site’s natural and cultural resources, and a controversial and ill-prepared new housing
development was begun in the center of the protected area. Building plots were already
laid out and plans for the infrastructure were well along. In response to the
Administration’s draft management plan, students collaborated with the Administration
staff and community representatives to propose possible alternatives that addressed the
increasing demands placed on this landscape. An important part of this contribution was
visualization of scenarios that would enable all participants to better see how
management practices, or lack thereof, would affect the region and its people.

Traditional house and garden in Klokoci

 New housing in Klokoci

OUTCOMES

Student reflections
Students were asked to keep journals of their experiences along the way to fulfill the
reflective component of service-learning. Through a seminar during the months after
returning from the Czech Republic, students further reflected on what the engagement
with their projects and communities meant to them. It is tempting to try to discuss those
perceptions by category, say “practical or professional insights” and “personal insights.”
However, the students themselves did not categorize their education this way, but instead
wrote about and discussed their ideas more holistically and in that spirit those responses
are briefly summarized here.

Concepts about the roles of designers of the built environment were broadened and
deepened. As students of landscape architecture, they shared much about their
understanding of design issues. For some, this was the first opportunity to work in a
team-based workshop setting. While their perceptions sometimes differed, they were
able to recognize the value of genuine differences and thus develop a more inclusive view
of the profession.

They also saw that the designer's role includes understanding social structure as well as
physical structures. In emerging societies such as the Czech Republic, daily life for many
is still a struggle. Those from more westernized countries recognized that many of the
simplest goods or services taken for granted at home were unavailable to the average
person. Observing changes in government and economic structures, they could discern
optimism in, cautious acceptance of, and resentment of capitalist ideals and practices all
at the same time. Intersecting with Czechs in these processes was invaluable to an
understanding of the sites studied, and to the realization that it is not a luxury but a
necessity to study the lifestyles and aspirations of community members. Solutions for
intervention must come from the place and its people.

In spite of such dramatic change underway in Eastern Europe, one constant was the rich
heritage evident in cities and countryside. For most of the students, the acts of walking in
these places and making sensory connections made them feel alive and refreshed. Such
positive impressions might be ascribed to the fact that each location had a wealth of
historic sources in its architecture and landscape elements. Much of this is well
preserved, sometimes through benign neglect, other times through the thoughtful
accretion of layers of physical fabric. Many of these places were successfully marketed to
tourists, offering the amenities and settings to which visitors are drawn. Other places are
just beginning a deliberate effort to become a magnet for heritage tourism. Still others
may be reluctant to make their sites accessible, rather preferring to maintain the status
quo as much as possible. Students could readily see conflicts and pressures of tourism on
historic landscapes and cities. Tourism often results in the commodification of a region's
culture, and a consequence of this can be erosion of the community's authenticity. When
culture is packaged and sold, it may be lost. Contemplating this made them question
what visitors to their respective home countries took away as reality and what role as
landscape architects they might play in presenting a place’s resources to others.

Community Benefits

At the heart of service-learning is the development of reciprocal benefits for students and
the service recipients. For each of the two landscapes that the students studied, the issue
was to find a solution compatible with the goals of nature protection, cultural heritage
protection, and local community needs, all of which were at odds with each other. From
the perspective of the Administration in Turnov, the collaboration between the Penn State
students and their office exceeded all expectations. The partnership was characterized by
many accomplishments that benefited all participants of the service-learning program.

All of the professionals involved had experienced the difficulties of becoming involved
too late in a landscape development scheme to have much of an impact. Now, ideas
generated from the students’ study have enabled more open community discussions and
cooperation between the community and the Administration. For example, the property
lot owners in Klokoci are seriously considering positive changes to plans for the new
housing development, changes that will be more compatible with the unique values of the
surrounding protected land. The student work is playing a vital role in this dialogue and
quest for landscape management solutions.

An unexpected benefit resulted from the students’ active collaboration and close team
work, which inspired community representatives as well as the Administration staff. It
became clear that an ability to cooperate in a close-knit setting is the most important
advantage realized from working with the Penn State students.
Institutional benefits

Universities are substantial repositories of knowledge. While the judgment of professors

in using that knowledge may be expected to be the equivalent of professionals—in this
case designers and planners—student judgment is shaped by the institution and the
experiences to which the students are exposed. Service-learning situations provide an
environment where that judgment can be exercised and refined, not only with feedback
and evaluation by the professor but with the insights and multiple perspectives of
community members. All of this is accomplished with the “safety net” and support of
instructors and the institution itself. The expected benefits of active learning—deeper
insights and engagement with the topic—are dramatically heightened in the study
abroad/service learning situation. In a new environment the inclination to learn is layered
with empathy for the host community and a deepened interest in learning and working for
positive change.

In the case reported here, the institution has an expressed research focus in the area of
historic and cultural landscape studies. Bringing that interest to a real application as a
vehicle for learning and service accomplishes an integration of the three components of
the mission of the University—Teaching, Research and Service. In a time when
Universities are widely criticized for their disconnect from the “real” world, such studies
represent a powerful response. In contrast to the criticisms of parochialism and
professional alienation leveled by authors such as Wilshire, in The Moral Collapse of the
University (1990) the explicitly interdisciplinary, intercultural and international elements
of this work point to the potential for truly transformative learning experiences for
students.

CONCLUSIONS

Heritage landscapes in emerging or developing economies are resource-poor. While

preservation of heritage is becoming a priority for citizens and government, the heritage
properties are often far too extensive to be addressed by the available resources. Too few
professionals, too little money, and too many other priorities, such as jobs, housing and
security occupy people’s time and energy. Concurrently, the teaching situations in many
North American Universities are experience-poor. Campuses are predominantly
suburban and distant from the challenges of either vibrant urban centers or declining rural
communities. The daily acquaintances of the students are much like themselves in dress,
accent and attitudes. Service-learning in a study abroad setting addresses both of these
issues, bringing quasi-professional services to needy situations that in turn provide a
richness of setting and immediacy to the relevance of students’ studies.

In a world where there are too few resources to address problems, this model should be
considered carefully by historic preservation interests and by agencies with resources as a
means to leverage the greatest possible benefit from limited means.
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Light, Richard, 2001. Making the Most of College: Students Speak Their Minds.
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