The mission of the office for Community Engagement is to improve quality of life through reciprocal partnerships in the community.

Goals

• Increase Community Engagement opportunities for staff, faculty, students and community
• Demonstrate a measurable impact in the community
• Grow SHP scholarship in the field of community engagement by promoting and supporting the following:
  • Faculty and staff completing the Faculty Fellows in Engaged Learning program
  • Students presenting posters at Expo and SHP Research Symposium
  • Students and mentors presenting community-based research at local regional, national and international symposia
  • Staff leading on and off-campus volunteer effort
• Build more community partnerships for project specific outcomes

Background and Baseline

Definitions

Community Engagement is an umbrella term comprised of the following activities:

Volunteerism – a form of aid or assistance that may have no intentional link to reflection or learning; focuses on the volunteers; may not be regularly scheduled or recurring

Community Service – structured, sustained activities designed to meet human and community needs; focuses on the community served and recipients

Service-Learning – seeks to strike a balance between student learning and community outcomes under the principle that service combined with learning adds value to each and transforms both; based on the assumption that learning does not necessarily occur as a result of experience itself but rather as a result of reflection designed to achieve specific learning outcomes; expand on volunteerism and community service.

Field Education – generally connected to the curriculum; provides benefits to the recipients; intended to primarily benefit the student/provider by enhancing learning in their field of study; may or may not involve reflection

Internship – experiences in which students engage to learn about their area of study and gain practical experience; intended to primarily benefit the student/provider; may or may not be connected to academic courses or involve reflection

* Note: The SHP Academic Affairs Committee (AAC) must review service-learning course proposals as noted in 2.3.1.1 Function of the SHP Faculty Handbook “…proposals requiring review by University committees….”

Source: Service Learning Essentials: Questions, Answers, and Lessons Learned Author: Barbara Jacoby, PhD

Article Title: Faculty Associate for Leadership & Community Service-Learning at the Adele H. Stamp Student Union-Center for Campus Life at the University of Maryland, College Park

Text utilized by the UAB Faculty Fellows in Engaged Scholarship program