Service learning is an activity that many institutions of higher learning have embraced to teach students the importance of sharing their knowledge and skills with the less fortunate members of the community. At the same time, the students provide learners from these communities with skills the learners would not otherwise have been able to attain. This also improves these learners’ chances of qualifying for admission to university study.

During the restrictions imposed by the COVID-19 pandemic, higher education institutions were challenged to find ways to engage with communities without coming into physical contact with the beneficiaries of such service-learning activities. As a staunch supporter of service-learning at higher education institutions globally, Dr Martina Jordaan, Head of Community Engagement, Research and Postgraduate Studies at the University of Pretoria’s Mamelodi Campus, has spearheaded a series of mutually beneficial virtual engagement opportunities to overcome these challenges. Such opportunities allow students to successfully complete the prescribed number of hours of community engagement activities required for service-learning modules, while the community members do not lose out on the all-important upskilling opportunities that the students can provide.

Among the beneficiaries of such service-learning activities are Grade 8 and 9 learners from schools in Mamelodi that form part of the University of Pretoria Pre-University Academy (UP-PUA). The success of this endeavour has expanded into a global service-learning initiative spanning several continents, which is already in its third year of implementation at the University of Pretoria.

Mamelodi learners learning to code drones through the virtual instruction of students from the Hong Kong Polytechnic University. They are assisted by engineering students from the University of Pretoria.

The first such virtual exchange took place with the Hong Kong Polytechnic University (HKPU) in 2021. It entailed the Hong Kong students teaching the Mamelodi learners to build a 360° cardboard viewer, use a 360° camera and create a 360° video. This was received with much enthusiasm, and opened up the learners’ horizons to life on another continent.

Following the success of the first collaboration between the University of Pretoria and HKPU, an initiative was launched in 2022 to teach the Mamelodi learners robotics and coding. This was continued in 2023 with an initiative to teach them to code drones. This latest intervention included 44 learners from the UP-PUA, who attended virtual classes presented by 40 students from HKPU. The learners came together in the computer laboratory on the Mamelodi Campus and were assisted by five engineering students from the University of Pretoria. The learners’ feedback indicated that although they found the experience to be fun and exciting, they had gained a lot more from the intervention by being exposed to career options they would never have considered before.

According to Dr Jordaan, the collaboration between the University of Pretoria and HKPU has developed into an ongoing partnership, which has ensured the sustainability of the service-learning initiative to the benefit of the learners in Mamelodi.

The success of this venture has led to two other virtual exchanges: a storytelling workshop with the University of Florida, which is now in its second year, and a cultural awareness project with Merrimack College in the USA, Tishk International University in Iraq, Sidi Mohamed Abedellah University in Morocco and ICFAI Foundation for Higher Education in India.

Through Dr Jordaan’s collaboration with the global members of the University Social Responsibility Network and the Higher Education Teaching and Learning Association, she believes that the institution of virtual exchanges, such as those that have been established with the University of Pretoria, will enable students’ service-learning activities to be extended to reach a much wider range of beneficiaries. By integrating social responsibility into teaching and learning activities for the betterment of society, universities are expanding their broader role in society.