another first year engagement program

We encourage you to also consider instituting at your school the FIRST YEAR PLEDGE OF SOCIAL JUSTICE, ECONOMIC STRENGTH AND ENVIRONMENTAL RESPONSIBILITY, a just starting complement to the long running Graduation Pledge of Social and Environmental Resoponsibility(www.graduationpledge.org):

I pledge that during my years in higher education I will explore and take into account the social, economic, and environmental consequences of my behavior and that of my institution. I will learn about issues of environmentalism, social justice, and economic strength, and will try to promote a sustainable and just society both at my institution and in the wider world. � �

The goal of the First Year Pledge is to promote social justice, environmental health, and economic growth in first-year college students in hopes of teaching and inspiring them to do more, to learn more, and to take initiative for themselves.

This complementary effort is a project of the American College Personnel Association (ACPA): College Student Educators International. See www.myacpa.org/task-force/sustainability. For further information regarding the First Year Pledge, please contact Dr. Boyd Yarbrough at boyd.yarbrough@furman.edu

neil wollman, senior Fellow at Bentley College, at 9:16 am EST on January 28, 2008

Student service and civic engagement

Clarion University has recently initiated an experimental class entitled Student Service and Civic Engagement. Running a model suggested by the work of Jerry Eisman and the American Democracy Project, this course is attempting to achieve the goals of enhanced understanding/involvement of democratic engagemant and student retention. In a nutshell the model includes: research & writing, project implementation, evaluation/assessment of outcomes, and celebration/recognition of accomplishment(s). I hope to be able to report succesful outcomes for both our community and our students at the conclusion of this experimental semester. For a copy of the syllabus or to further this conversation, please email me at ggoodman@clarion.edu

Greg S. Goodman, Clarion University, at 12:25 pm EST on January 28, 2008

First Year and Civic Engagement

An experimental and but highly successful “curriculum development track” took place during the 2008 Association for General and Liberal Studies meeting. Over 30 people participated in one or more of the sessions in the track titled “Civic Engagement, General Education, and Interdisciplinary Curricular Development.”

This interactive pre-conference workshop—followed by linked concurrent sessions—models effective practices for interdisciplinary curriculum development ... to promote civic engagement. To stimulate student engagement in and comprehension of the pending 2008 presidential election, this conference track celebrates the 75th anniversary of FDR’s 1933 inauguration.

For more information seewww.bsu.edu/web/agls

Susan Feiner, USM and AGLS, at 3:10 pm EST on January 28, 2008

In partial response to AYY, I agree that we should be skeptical about things we encounter for the first time, especially if those encounters are not wholly positive. With service-learning, I was skeptical myself the first time I heard about it. Indeed, the first couple of times I incorporated it into my course, I did a poor job of making it educational for my students. I was guilty of not putting much effort into that aspect of the course and I do not think it was terribly helpful to my students. After doing some research, attending workshops, and working hard to do it properly, though, I have seen it become a transformative learning experience for my students.

I currently use service learning in a very limited way to enhance, not take over, the course in which I use it. Students who actually get a chance to test the theory in practice better understand the theory and better understand why they are studying in college in the first place. We have to remember that the educational process is a means to an end and not the end itself, and if students can get a glimpse of the theory in practice, the theory usually makes more sense and actually becomes meaningful.

At Stetson, we have just instituted a first-year seminar class for our incoming Bonner Scholar students (students who receive scholarship funds in exchange for agreeing to ten hours per week of community service). We wanted to put an academic anchor to their service so that their community engagement does become educational and not simply perfunctory. We focus on issues of poverty and social justice as well as on how individuals and communities affect each other. We do not define “social justice” for them but rather explore the concept through texts such as Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics, Reinhold Niebuhr’s Moral Man and Immoral Society, Langdon Gilkey’s Shantung Compound, Gloria Naylor’s Mama Day, and Alex Kotlowitz’s There Are No Children Here. As part of my class, students are required to spend an hour a week in a Title I elementary school working with a child who is behind in reading skills. The great majority of these children come from low-income families or families whose primary language is not English. My students get an introduction to the realities of our community by developing a relationship with their children and learn that some kids do not have the same advantages as others when it comes to education and, therefore, “upward mobility.” Though the results are preliminary (but intially promising) here at Stetson, I have seen my students at a previous institution transformed through the experience of reading theory and experiencing reality together.

We are currently in the process of reforming our curriculum and course structure at Stetson to make room for more in-depth engagement of material for our students. We expect that one way for the additional engagement to take place will be through experiential learning including service-learning and community-based research courses. We are also having preliminary discussions about instituting a certificate program in community engagement.

While service-learning can be weak (in the same way that some professors offer the same, tired lectures year after year without putting any effort into that more traditional form of “teaching"), service-learning done well usually takes much more work than more traditional pedagogical methods. I will be the first to agree that service-learning may not be appropriate for all courses or even all instructors, but all of our students will leave us to become members of their communities, and my hope is that we will have prepared them well to be contributing members of their communities. Using the right amount of community engagement to enhance the academic theory can be a highly effective means to acheive that goal.

Greg Sapp, Hal S. Marchman Chair of Civic and Social Responsibility at Stetson University, at 10:20 am EST on January 29, 2008

I’m old, what do I know

I remember a time when civic engagement was not just something you could “opt” for in college, it was simply a part of the culture of being a college student. Yes, there is a vast difference between community colleges and residential colleges in this area, and there may even be differences between traditional and non-traditional aged students; but we have a certain responsibility as college administrators to present the opportunity for civic engagement through our class offerings and our cultural events on campus. Encouraginig students to be civic minded is more than just a curriculum “idea” but should be basic to our desire to promote divergent learning.

MTK, Director of Admissions at Finlandia University, at 3:15 pm EST on February 1, 2008