Proceedings of 10th Global Business and Social Science Research Conference
23 -24 June 2014, Radisson Blu Hotel, Beijing, China, ISBN: 978-1-922069-55-9
The Service Experiential Learning Pedagogy in the
Undergraduate Marketing Education: A Passive Learners’
Perspective
Jonathan Horner, Jordan Dolph, Kyler Huber and Wei Song
From the pedagogy perspective, one of the major problems is too much emphasis on the importance of
business/management theories and concepts while failing to prepare the students for their future realworld challenges (Johnson, 2011, Michaelsen, L.K. Mccord, Rubin & Dierdorff, 2013). Extensive research
into experiential learning in the business discipline has been undertaken (e.g., Bennis & O‟Toole, 2005;
Blaylock, McDaniel, Falk Hollandsworth & Kopf, 2009; Johnson, 2011; Rubin & Dierdorff, 2013). The
research results support the proposition that the applied nature of business education might make it a
more appropriate discipline for the use of experiential learning than would be the case for a discipline with
a stronger theoretical orientation. The majority of the literature focuses on the effectiveness of learning
outcomes at a general level and from a pedagogical perspective; the impact on learning outcomes from
the learner’s perspective has not been fully explored. This study investigates the possible factors which
have the significant impact on those passive learners/students who are taking an experiential learning
approach.
This is an exploratory study thus a qualitative study is preferred. This study has adopted multiple data
sources, comprising classroom observation, in-depth semi-structured interviews and reflective notes from
former students who have undertaken experiential learning projects.
The study has revealed the service experiential learning method has a significant impact on those
passive learners who possess little knowledge of working with clients and limited background in
marketing management. In other words, these students with low level motivation have the challenges to
manage the higher order skills, such as application, analysis, synthesis, and evaluation (Bloom, 1956).
The study has found that four possible factors positively influence these passive learners. Firstly, the
shifted responsibility; in a traditional approach, passive learners can survive by taking the lecture from the
professor without active participation but with an experiential learning approach, the students must
manage their own learning and go from the state of “what should do” to “what ought to do”; that is, from
being told what to complete to determining themselves what they must accomplish.
Secondly, the experiential learning method raised the students’ interest in learning; this may have
occurred because the questions in the experiential learning project, which were derived from a real and
tangible business, are both unique and relevant to students. This can directly increase students’ learning
curiosity, itself the basis for interest in a particular course of study.
Thirdly, through enhanced self-actualization, experiential learning made passive learners feel that they
had accomplished rather than finished something, which motivated and excited those students who were
less motivated learners.
Finally, experiential learning has provided the direct benefits for the passive learners to improve their
resume which enables them to compete with other fellow students without experiential learning
experience in the job market, as stated by one of the students:
The resume enhancement of experiential learning goes a long way when future employers see that realworld business experience has been done prior to collegiate graduation.
Keywords: Service experiential learning pedagogy, passive learners’ perspective, low
student involvement
_____________________________________________________________________
Jonathan Horner, Jordan Dolph, Kyler Huber and Wei Song, PhD., School of Business (AACSB), Black
Hills State University, Spearfish, SD. U.S.A.