Want to know more about incorporating community-based research into your kit of teaching tools? Follow this link to valuable resources.
Thinking about a service-learning course to integrate community-based experiences for your students in relation to your course content? Follow this link to a list of local community organizations with which Dickinson has close ties, and which in many cases have been sites of service-learning course collaboration.
Service-Learning/Community-Based Research Faculty Study Group
In May 2005, Dickinson College instituted an annual Faculty Study Group to support the development of new service-learning and community-based research courses. Faculty members who participate in this Study Group gain familiarity with theoretical and practical dimensions of service-learning and community-based research pedagogy. They also identify appropriate community partners, and design their course and community-based learning/research experience. Participants receive a stipend.
The deadline for proposals for service-learning/CBR course development stipends for next academic year is March 31, 2018.
Access the detailed stipend announcement and application form.
Criteria for Service-Learning Course Designation--Click Here.
Service-learning is a method of providing students with community-based experience that benefits, whether through direct service or applied research, community partners and enhances the students' academic experience. The community experience is integrated into the course readings, lectures, discussion, and writing assignments. Students are evaluated in terms of regular academic standards, not for the services provided.
At Dickinson, support for service-learning course development is part of our broader interest in supporting innovative and active pedagogies, and specifically community-based learning experiences.
Faculty may use these stipends to develop a service-learning component to an existing course, or to develop a new service-learning course. Faculty receiving these stipends will be asked to participate in a "service-learning study group." This informal study group will allow participating faculty to benefit from each others' experiences, build upon existing models and resources, and create a distinctively Dickinson service-learning knowledge base that can be shared with the faculty at-large.
Specifically, participating faculty will be asked to:
- Teach a service-learning course during academic year 2018-2019.
- Participate in a summer study group to be scheduled for May 23-24, 2018 to explore the conceptual issues in service-learning course development and to refine their own early planning for course development.
- Contact their community partner and collaboratively develop the service-learning/community-based research plans, to be integrated into course design and the syllabus.
- Participate in part-day sessions before the Fall and Spring semesters so that participating faculty can present their preliminary course designs and plans for community partnerships for informal peer feedback.
- Gather at the end of next academic year to reflect on your experiences and guide the further development of service-learning/community-based research at Dickinson
- Prepare an evaluative report of your service-learning/CBR teaching experience
*Upon request, Assistant Provost Shalom Staub will assist in identifying appropriate community partnerships or appropriate resource materials, such as discipline-specific service-learning models, service-learning based assignments, or student or course evaluation tools.
Faculty interested in applying for this course development stipend should review the application form and contact Associate Provost Shalom Staub with any questions. The application asks faculty members to briefly address the following questions:
- What are the academic/intellectual issues which you plan to address through the service-learning experience?
- With which community contacts or community partners do you think you will develop this service-learning experience?
- What, if known, might be the nature of the community experience? (For example, community service, or community-based research that creates some value for the community partner.) How do you anticipate that the community will benefit from the service/research?
If the proposal is to modify an existing course, you will be asked to submit a syllabus and indicate how you think the service-learning experience will impact the existing course. If the proposal is to develop a new course, you will be asked to provide information about the course and how service-learning will be integrated into its design. Any new course proposal will have to be reviewed by APSC.