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Faculty Engagement

Faculty Reading Groups or Learning Circles

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A reading group or learning circle can be an effective strategy for building understanding and participation, including of faculty (and also of other constituents, should you involve them). These structures and forms can be well aligned with those that faculty are accustomed to working with and even with faculty governance structures and strategic planning. Allegheny College, with the leadership of David Roncolato, developed a Civic Engagement Working Group, which includes a variety of faculty, community partners, staff, and students.  Using many of the readings from the High-Impact Initiative, but also augmenting the list, the Working Group is meeting regularly.  They've divided up the articles, so that pairs of individuals take an article, reading it and presenting it to the Working Group (over an assigned schedule).  Dave shares that the process has been extremely beneficial for broadening support as well as integrating important ideas, scholarship, and research to move their efforts forward.  Below is the reading list.  You can find many of these on the Literature page and others online or through your campus's library.

Civic Engagement Working Group

Reading List

(example from Allegheny College)

Big Picture 

• Caryn McTighe Musil, “Remapping Education for Social Responsibility: Civic, Global, and U.S. Diversity” in John Saltmarsh and Matthew Hartley, eds. “To Serve a Larger Purpose” Engagement for Democracy and the Transformation of Higher Education, Temple University Press, 2011.
• John Saltmarsh, Matt Hartley, and Patti Clayon, Democratic Engagement White Paper, NERCHE, 2009.
• Donald  W. Harward, “ Introduction and Framing Essay”,  Civic Values, Civic Practices, Donald Harward, Editor, Bringing Theory to Practice, 2013.
• “Why Education for Democracy Matters”. In AAC&U,   A Crucible Moment: College Learning & Democracy’s Future, 2012, pp. 1-15.
• Richard M. Battistoni and Nicholas V. Longo, “Putting Students at the Center of Civic Engagement”. In John Saltmarsh and Matthew Hartley, eds. “to Serve a Larger Purpose” Engagement  for Democracy and the Transformation of Higher Education, Temple University Press, 2011, pp. 199-216.

Issues and Challenges

• John Kania and Mark Kramer, “Collective Impact”, Stanford Social Innovation Review, Winter 2011.
• Ariane Hoy, Mathew Johnson and Robert Hackett, “Disciplining Higher Education for Democratic Community Engagement”, Dan Butin and Scott Seider eds. The Engaged Campus: Certificates, Minors and Majors as the New Community Engagement, Palgrave, 2012, pp.177-186.
• Barbara Jacoby, “Facing the Unsettled Questions about Service-Learning”. In Jean R. Strait and Marybeth Lima, eds., The Future of Service-Learning: New Solutions for Sustaining and Improving Practice, Stylus, 2009, pp. 90-105.
• Lorilee R. Sandmann “Community Engagement: Second-generation Promotion and Tenure Issues and Challenges”. In Jean R. Strait and Marybeth Lima, eds., The Future of Service-Learning: New Solutions for Sustaining and Improving Practice, Stylus, 2009, pp.67-89.

Community Voice 

• Steven D. Mills, “The Four Furies: Primary Tensions between Service-Learners and Host Agencies”, Michigan Journal of Community Service Learning, Fall 2012, pp. 33-43.
• Elizabeth Carmichael Strong, Patrick M. Green, Micki Meyer, and Margaret A. Post, “Future Directions in Campus-Community Partnerships. In Jean R. Strait and Marybeth Lima, eds., The Future of Service-Learning: New Solutions for Sustaining and Improving Practice, Stylus, 2009, pp. 9-32.
• Melissa Kesler Gilbert, Mathew Johnson and Julie Plaut, “Cultivating Interdependent Partnerships for Community Change and Civic Education”. In Jean R. Strait and Marybeth Lima, eds., The Future of Service-Learning: New Solutions for Sustaining and Improving Practice, Stylus, 2009, pp.33-51.
• Elmer Freeman, Susan Gust and Deborah Aloshen “Why Faculty Promotion and Tenure Matters to Community Partners”, Metropolitan Universities: An International Forum, v. 20(2), August 2009, 87-103.

Career Development

• Kathryn S. Steinberg, Julie A. Hatcher, Robert G. Bringle, “Civic-Minded Graduate: A North Star”, Michigan Journal of Community Service Learning, Fall 2011, pp. 19-33.
• LEAP, Emplyer-Educator Compact: making Quality a Priority as Americans Go to College, 2013, and LEAP High-Impact Educational Practices. 2008 (one page summary). 

U.S. Diversity

• Susan Sturm, Tim Eatman, John Saltmarsh and Adam Bush, Full Participation: Building the Architecture for Diversity and Public Engagement in Higher Education, NERCHE, 2011.
• Ashley Finley and Tia McNair, High-Impact Practices and the New Majority Student: Findings, Strategies, and Reflection, AAC&U Annual Meeting Jan. 2013.

Global Citizenship 

• Madeleine F. Green, “Global Citizenship: What Are We Talking About and Why Does It Matter”, International Educator, May-June 2012.
• Michael Woolf, “Another Mishegas: Global Citizenship”, Frontiers: the Interdisciplinary Journal of Study Abroad. 

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