Community Engaged Programs

It is also a “boundary spanning” activity in that it requires active involvement from people both within and outside of the classroom context, often resulting in participant contributors who represent a variety of generations, ethnicities, social groups, and experience levels (Billig and Furco, 2002, p.vii). Service-learning is designed to reduce the boundaries between an institutional campus environment and the community around it. It is designed to connect learning to real experience through service and reflection (Ball and Schilling, 2006; Becker, 2000). As a baseline to facilitate this development, service-learning is distinct from other types of community service and civic engagement experiences in that the service-learning experience must not only have a service and reflective component but also be clearly tied to the curriculum through learning objectives and theoretical underpinnings (Bloomquist, 2015; Pritchard, 2001). As Barbara Holland, former Director of the U.S. National Service-Learning Clearinghouse, shared, “Service-learning is all in the hyphen. It is the enrichment of specific learning goals through structured community service opportunities that respond to community-identified needs and opportunities.” (Kenworthy-U’Ren, Taylor, and Petri, 2006: 121).

The critical difference of service learning and the traditional learning style is that students are learning and addressing real needs in the community. Which connect students to the community through meaningful interactions with others, safety, and educational needs. This specific course includes readings, discussions, and activities to support

My personal involvement with the program enabled me to serve a pre-existing organization in the community actively working to address the social injustices present in Athens, particularly in the scope of Youth and Education advocacy. With my continued involvement with the organization since freshman year until present, my experiences with the organization helped me better understand the academic and personal challenges that these students face, and how I can work to address them with the program with the community

Since the 1990s, service-learning and volunteerism have become pervasive throughout higher education. Many campuses now have a center for civic engagement and have hired service-learning coordinators. Large organizations and initiatives have dedicated themselves to promoting and enhancing engagement research and practices. We even have engaged campus awards and designations at the national and state level. Civic engagement is a professional field of study and practice and it is our best hope for bringing in a discussion about sense of community.

Author Yvette Boysen writes about the President’s Community Engagement Honor Roll initiative created by the Agnes Scott College, that recognizes volunteers on several different levels. JLP Prince, director of community engagement, suggest that if schools recognize volunteers and their service hours in the same manner they acknowledge those with high grade point averages, students will be more inclined to civically engage within their community. He provides several examples of what constitutes volunteer hours from group service projects to community-based research projects to internships with nonprofits or government agencies. Such a creative tactic developed by the university sheds a positive light on both the core values of the campus and

Service-learning isn't just restricted to teaching leadership skills. Service-learning also gives students the opportunity to enrich the lives of others with what they've learned, or with what they already know, whether the students are aware of it or not. For example, as Kelly Millicent, a lecturer for Barry University expressed, “Students in an English writing class could provide free tutoring or proofreading sessions for new United States citizens with limited English language proficiency and then synthesize their experiences in a class journal” (83). With an influx of immigrants from countries around the world to Brevard County, linguistical assistance from proficient English speakers can be a great service-learning task at Eastern Florida State College. Perhaps a language exchange of sorts can happen. Such an exchange would fall under the reciprocity portion of service-learning, which is more often than not, a huge part of the service-learning experience. In a short video interview titled “The Importance of Service Learning”, with Charis, last name not given, a student at Gateway Technical College, she recalls her Service-Learning experience of teaching others how to grow and maintain vegetables:

My service learning experience opened my eyes to many new ideas and supported the information that I have been learning in class. For my service learning, I went to West Elementary school and worked in an all girls first grade classroom. West is located in a very urban neighborhood right outside of East Lansing. In the beginning of my service learning, I was in culture shock due to the size of the school, make up of the students/teachers, and the social economic status of the students. All of these components were drastically different from the school I came from. At first, I didn’t know what to think of the school or students, but I eventually realized that their goals and priorities were different from the elementary school I went to. The three main concepts that stuck out to me during my service learning experience include, the social construction of gender, special and gifted education, and funding.

In 2013 Nazareth College located in Rochester, NY was awarded the Presidential Award for Community Service, based largely on an innovative education summer program for urban youth that included service-learning classes. In the same year this program was terminated and service-learning faculty had to advocate in order to maintain a director level for the Center for Service Learning. These paradoxical events indicate the ongoing opportunities and challenges for institutionalizing engaged learning, service, and scholarship at tuition-driven institutions. The case highlights strategic

d.). Thereby, expertise and wisdom in advancing knowledge and understanding regarding community engagement becomes important to academia as well as for community leaders and stakeholders. The aforementioned correlation remains crucial for the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley (UTRGV), as it consolidates the University of Texas Pan American (UTPA) and the University of Texas Brownsville (UTB) into a single entity. This correlation intellectualizes that community engagement not be regarded as a separate or distinct activity within any university, but as a shared enterprise between the university and its community partners. The preceding of which may only be accomplished by an exchange of knowledge and expertise. In respect to this study, this exchange produces mutual benefits by implementing programs such as the Southwest Border Nonprofit Resource Center (SBNRC) with knowledge of community engagement while regarding the implications to be had for the guiding principles of the UTRGV as a new

In order for service learning projects to be successful it is important to establish partnerships with families, parents, and community organizations. PBL projects must encourage and even require students to be engaged in hands on activities or services that meet the needs of community. Service learning and PBL projects and activities cannot be completed through lectures but must actively engage students. By incorporating both of these methods of teaching and learning students are able to learn from the experience as well as meet project requirements. Through using these instructional strategies teachers are able to data about the students during observations, conferences, and informal assessments. These informal assessments allow the teacher to assess where students are and what they have learned, while also allowing the student to gain more knowledge about the topic. It is important that PBL and

According to Kathleen Flecky and Lynn Gitlow, service-learning is defined as, “learning that occurs in experiences, reflection, and civic engagement” (Flecky & Gitlow, 2011). In recent years more universities are implementing service learning into their curriculum. A key concept of service learning is civic responsibility. Civic responsibility can simply be defined as your responsibilities as a citizen. As will be shown later in this paper, service learning can have many benefits not only to a student, but also to the community members

As a living-learning program promoting community engagement there are many concepts that are simultaneously applied to the VCU ASPiRE community and the communities at which we set to impact. While building the goals of community engagement within the Richmond community and local areas we are also promoting and building the same aspect within the programs community. We live, learn, and engage with in both communities. Which suggest how community engagement concepts relate to the principles that VCU ASPiRE’s community engagement. There are several concepts that I find to be essential to community engagement. ASPiRE itself is a community engagement focused on creating positive change in communities. In the context of VCU ASPiRE, I find Community

Participating in the community more deeply will provide me with the opportunity to nurture a partnership with parents, students, and non-profits and better understand how the school and non-school factors contribute to academic achievement. Having this understanding helps a teacher alter their instructional practices in the classroom to meet students’ needs. Community engagement with after-school programs also allows teachers to build relationships with parents and students to motivate them to achieve academic success. More importantly, it will create an opportunity to experience how effective collaboration between teachers, students, parents, and non-profits can drive academic and behavioral success in school in a way that cannot be learned in a lecture-style graduate-level class.

The Society for Experiential Education defines service learning as, “any carefully monitored service experience in which a student has intentional learning goals and reflects actively on what he or she is learning throughout the experience” (Staton 1). Service learning is a great opportunity to get extra learning experiences while also experiencing the community around the universities campus. “Service learning allows students to apply what they are learning from their instructors, peers, and readings to genuine tasks that occur outside the four walls of the classroom while simultaneously helping others” (Staton 1). Universities are using service learning to expand beyond the classroom and provide students with experiences that will

Benson, Harkavy, & Puckett, (2000) suggest that a primary issue that academics and education practitioners should seek to resolve is how democracy is realized in neighborhoods. Inspired by John Dewey, the authors suggest that strengthening local democratic neighborly communities is a way of advancing collaborative relationships. The authors propose that partnering with university supported research programs and academically based community service learning programs is one way of forging democratic and mutually beneficial partnerships between academic institutions and communities. University partnerships within challenged communities have in instances been conceptualized as a means of intervention (Cohen, 2001). However, this intervention has at times resulted in projects which position the university researchers and their service learning programs students as problem solvers, attempting to examine poverty and a community 's state of decline, and characterize the residents of the