Moving the Classroom into the Community: Four Examples of Academic Civic Engagement
Tuesday, April 14, 11:45-1:15 - Buntrock 142
Dana Gross, Psychology; Eric Fure-Slocum, History, American Conversations; Nate Jacobi, Center for Experiential Learning; Paul Roback, MSCS-Statistics; Kathy Tegtmeyer Pak, Political Science and Asian Studies
(co-sponsors: Center for Experiential Learning - Lilly Grant and Civic Engagement Program)
Civic engagement and classroom learning need not operate independently — in fact, when it is well conceived, course-based (academic) civic engagement can enhance academic learning and prepare students for active citizenship. As the lines between the classroom and the community become blurred, students learn to make connections across disciplines and to contextualize knowledge. In addition, connections with the community can stimulate intellectual inquiry and research for both students and faculty.
Four faculty will share their experiences of incorporating an academic civic engagement component (i.e., service-learning, community-based research, public scholarship, etc.) into one of their courses during the fall semester. Each presenter will talk about the community project, with a special emphasis on the connection between the project and course learning objectives and the impact on student learning. They will also discuss the value and challenges of community-based learning as a pedagogical approach.
Four different academic civic engagement courses will be highlighted:
* American Conversations 101 (Eric Fure-Slocum) – Students participated in voter registration and other forms of political engagement to explore how voting fit into past and present understandings of American citizenship
* Immigration and Citizenship (Kathy Tegtmeyer Pak) -- Students examined resources available to immigrants in Rice County and completed community-based research reports in collaboration with Rice County Growing Up Healthy
* Infant Behavior and Development (Dana Gross) -- Students partnered with the Faribault Early Childhood and Family Education Center to produce two educational videos: “Play and Motor Development in Somali and Sudanese Cultures” and “Language and Literacy”
* Statistics for Sciences (Paul Roback) – Teams of students analyzed survey data from farmers on river-friendly practices for the Cannon River Watershed Partnership and data from a bi-annual residential survey for the Dakota County Office of Planning and Analysis
Please see here for a description of other courses that have included an academic civic engagement component during the 2008-09 academic year.
Further reading:
Caryn McTighe Musil, "Educating for Citizenship," Peer Review, June 2003.
http://www.stolaf.edu/services/cel/FacultyStaff/Educating for Citizenship- PR.pdf
Eugene M. Lang, "Distinctly American: The Residential Liberal Arts College," Daedalus, Winter 1999 (pp. 142- 149 are most relevant). Eugene Lang is Chairmen Emeritus of Swarthmore College and Founder and President of Project Pericles.
http://www.projectpericles.org/Eugene_Lang.pdf
Jeffery Howard, “Principles of Good Practice for Service-Learning Pedagogy” (Excerpted from Michigan Journal of Community Service Learning: Service-Learning Course Design Workbook, University of Michigan: OCSL Press, 2001)
