The Impact of Service-Based Learning Approach on Student Performance in Water Engineering Courses

Nowadays, students are facing challenges to understand and learn the course applications in real community world by using traditional (i.e. classroom) approach. This service-based learning (SBL) approach is introduced to make the impact of the subject matter to the current practice. This paper presents the SBL approach and the outcome of this approach on the student performance. This learning approach has been chosen as a part of course assessment involving a class of Hydraulics (2nd year students), Urban Water System Design (3rd year students), Ocean and Coastal Engineering (4th year students) and the collaboration with Department of Irrigation and Drainage (DID) of Manjung district as well as the community partners from Taman Desa, Manjung. Students collaborated with the community partners for solving problems in context of engineering perspective. Students performed background research on the problems prior to their meetings with the community partners. Solution designs are then developed based on the collected data and discussions with them. On the final meeting of this program, a mini celebration event named "ATE RIVER KOME" was conducted in appreciating the commitment given by the students and community partners. The ideas and solution demonstration from the students were then publicly presented in an event. The event had received impulsive support from DID of Perak, Manjung Municipal Council, SK Sri Bayu students, teachers, and volunteers from around of Malaysia. The results found that this project was successfully enhanced students' performance in selected program outcome (PO) with more than 95. Through this learning approach, students grown their potential in problem-solving skills, skills in making decision as well as creativity in meeting the community partner's needs. © 2022 American Institute of Physics Inc.. All rights reserved.