A Call to Action: Translating the Spirit of Stewardship of Place Into Practice

This brief serves as a practice-oriented companion to Recommitting to Stewardship of Place: Creating and Sustaining Thriving Communities for the Decades Ahead  . Whereas the original philosophical report provides a set of principles that constitute stewardship in a new postsecondary context (see principles on pg. 4), this practitioner guide provides tangible examples of campus actions that bring this mission to life. Our hope is that this guide inspires campus leaders, faculty, staff, students, and many others to consider how stewardship of place fits within their everyday work as teachers, learners, and institution builders. Read the full brief here: https://compact.org/resources/a-call-to-action-translating-the-spirit-of-stewardship-of-place-into-practice.

Summer Intensive on Community-Engaged Scholarship: Generative Tensions and Future Directions for Professional Development

Since the mid-1990s, universities and colleges have sought to institutionalize service-learning and community engagement. Along with aligning institutional roles and rewards, professional development for faculty and academic staff has been a key strategy for institutionalization. However, as Welch and Plaxton-Moore (2017) noted, professional development around community engagement is rarely guided by theory or conceptual frameworks and often lacks impact or outcome data. As a response to this critique, this paper presents Michigan State University’s Summer Intensive on Community-Engaged Scholarship, a weeklong professional development program for faculty, academic staff, and advanced graduate students offered in person annually. Read the research article…

Research Code of Ethics

With support from community organizing partners, Human Impact Partners’ research team created a Research Code of Ethics to (1) Introduce community organizing partners to our values as researchers, (2) Address organizers’ concerns about ethical research practices, and (3) Hold ourselves accountable to conducting ethical, responsible, and engaged research. Read the guidebook in full here!

Principles of Anti-Oppressive Community Engagement for University Educators and Researchers

In the aftermath of George Floyd’s murder in 2020, the authors began articulating these principles and practices more concretely as a commitment to holding ourselves accountable for practicing antiracist and anti-oppressive CETR. Their roles at the university call for deep community engagement and interdisciplinary collaboration on and off campus. They were therefore able to draw on years of lessons learned from a circle of colleagues and other collaborators with diverse identities, roles, and experiences with CETR, including community partners, faculty, staff, and students at Northeastern and other universities. Their work was also informed by a wide range of scholars and…

Community Colleges for Democracy: Aligning Civic and Community Engagement with Institutional Priorities

This publication from Campus Compact presents a set of contemporary case studies examining how civic engagement and learning at community colleges can be leveraged to advance institutional effectiveness, college completion, and student success. Edited by Verdis L. Robinson and Clayton A. Hurd, this book is available from Campus Compact as a download or in hard copy. Community colleges, as local institutions, are an essential part of the American landscape of higher education, playing key roles to democratize it and to provide more people access to upward mobility. At the same time, community colleges are especially well positioned to provide benefits for the larger…