Community Connected Learning (INTD 0121)- Every Semester

In this course students will develop and implement community connected projects in collaboration with community partners to contribute to the public good. Center for Community Engagement (CCE) instructors will meet with students weekly in cohorts to develop social-issue knowledge, build collaboration skills, and strengthen their civic identity to complement their new or existing community partnership experiences. 

 

Middlebury Contact: Shannon McClain (smclain@middlebury.edu)

Any social issue topic area is welcome, as nearly any community-based learning opportunity can help us reach our learning goals (see below).

Instructors support students’ civic development around how they show up with self-awareness, clear communication, and good project management tools. Since the instructors support multiple projects in the course (around 12+), the project should be something that the community partner can primarily advise.

We support our students to bring civic knowledge (research about the social issue and the community context of your work), civic skills (self-awareness of their strengths and learning goals, how to approach the work collaboratively), and civic identity (understanding societal inequalities and their positionality within them, exploring their commitment as a contributing community member). Depending on the student, they may be matched with a project/partner based on extensive prior experience in a particular area, or a general interest to learn more– please let us know if you need someone with specific skills and instructors can seek students with certain skill sets if that would be necessary/helpful. Instructors support a matching process before the semester begins to make sure partners/students are good fits for the project.

We hope that students develop learning in the following areas through a combination of their community-connected work and course meetings:
1: Civic Knowledge: Students will develop, express and apply knowledge of community context, and how communities structure, govern and sustain themselves as they work toward their goals.
2: Civic Skills: Students will identify, develop and apply civic skills to effectively and appropriately contribute to communities through partnership and collaboration with community organizations and networks.
3: Civic Identity: Students will deepen their understandings of the values and perspectives that shape and inform their approaches to ethical, authentic community engaged work

Ideal partnerships/projects should be available to begin in the second week of the semester (mid-Septemer or mid-February) and continue for approximately 12 weeks until early December or late April. Students would be able to contribute about 3-5 hours/week to the endeavor, and provide a closing presentation of their work in December or May. The projects can host 1-3 students per semester.

We expect some clear goals and direction to help a student understand the project and its needs (both big picture and how those play out on a weekly basis), and accessibility to have at least one check in per week of supervision and support in the evolving tasks and understanding of their work.

Helping create a new online format for an organization’s volunteer training; developing a social media campaign for public health messaging; compiling a well-researched resource for an organization’s clients of local poverty-alleviation support services; streamlining systems for managing volunteer tutors to better recruit and support language learning program.

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Published On: January 24, 2024

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