Service Learning is typically defined by four basic components:

1. Preparation - Students need not worry about a Service Learning project piling on extra work in a class. Before a project is implemented, faculty and members of the Service Learning Office work together on ways to integrate the project into the syllabus. Service Learning becomes a part of the curriculum, not an addition or extra assignment for students to complete. Objectives are set, as are the skills to be learned.
2. Action - The Service Learning project is performed.
3. Reflection - Throughout the Service Learning experience, students analyze their experiences through journals or other creative means and communicate through discussion with their peers. When the project is completed, students reflect on the experience, and on their personal growth, and their effect on the community, from the project's beginning to its conclusion.
4. Celebration - At the completion of a successful project, the students, faculty and community partner realize how each has benefited from the project and recognizes that fact in a manner each sees fit.