Synergy Archives
516 High Street, MS 5291, Bellingham, WA 98225-5996 phone 360.650.7312 fax 360.650.6895 email
Synergy is published quarterly by Washington Campus Compact. We solicit submissions and accept, with prior approval, unsolicited submissions. All submissions may be edited. Please send all queries, final submissions, and general comments/suggestions to Brian Heinrich at brian.heinrich@wwu.edu. If you are looking for a past Synergy Issue, please visit our archive toolbar.
Washington Campus Compact often follows the rhythm of the academic calendar our member campuses follow. Summer often means a slightly slower pace and a time to write year-end progress reports; plan the Members’ Meeting and Continuums of Service conference; and hopefully take some time off for vacation. We are doing those things, however, because we were so successful with our grant writing this year, this summer we are also working diligently to implement a number of new and expanded programs.
Both the AmeriCorps Retention Project and the Students in Service AmeriCorps programs will be expanding. The AmeriCorps Retention Project has grown from being a 20-full time member team in Washington to a 45 full-time member team expanded to include Oregon and Idaho. The Retention Project connects college student mentors with middle, high school, or other college students to support their success and advancement in school. The Students in Service AmeriCorps program will expand to 12 new states, bringing the total number of states served by Students in Service AmeriCorps to 19. The tremendous growth of both programs is a testament to the outstanding work done by our many campus partners over the years, the burgeoning interest in national service and service-learning, and the valuable network established by Campus Compact.
I’m also excited to announce that our Northwest Sustainability Initiative was fully funded by Learn and Serve America. This program will increase habitat restoration and green energy practices through service-learning opportunities by faculty and students in the Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) fields at higher education campuses in Idaho, Oregon, and Washington. Fifteen campuses in the three states will receive funding to implement various programs on their campuses as part of the Northwest Sustainability Initiative.
We are pleased to be able to bring you, our members, these programs. We also look forward to working with our colleagues at Oregon Campus Compact as well as other state Campus Compact offices to continue to build our network.
Finally, I invite you to attend the annual Members’ Meeting on October 7, 2010 at Central Washington University in Ellensburg, WA. Staff is preparing an agenda that we hope you will find informative and stimulating. It will be a great opportunity for you to network with your colleagues across the state. And finally, I am excited to announce that the 14th Annual Continuums of Service Conference will be held in San Diego, California on April 27-29, 2011. We will be issuing a Call for Proposals soon. More information will be forthcoming about both events; but be sure to mark your calendars now!
The AmeriCorps Retention Project is proud to report an expansion of 15 additional slots for the 2010-2011 grant year in Idaho, Oregon and Washington for a total of 45 AmeriCorps Retention Project members placed to coordinate mentoring programs for students at risk of dropping out of school. Program wide, 45 AmeriCorps members will annually recruit 1,350 college student mentors to mentor 5,625 middle/high school and college students at risk of dropping out of school.
The start date for the AmeriCorps Retention Project is August 1, 2010. The training orientation will be held August 16-19 and will cover topics such as:
Program Development
How to Create Partnerships
Diversity Training;
Group Collaboration
Conflict Management
Goal Setting and many others!
These topics comprise an ongoing training initiative to target civic engagement and workforce skill development among AmeriCorps Retention Project members.
The AmeriCorps Retention Project will be hosted at the following Campuses:
Washington: Bellingham Technical College, Big Bend Community College, Cascadia Community College, Central Washington University, Clark College, Clover Park Technical College, Edmonds Community College, Evergreen State College, Gonzaga University, Green River Community College, Heritage University, Lake Washington Technical College, Pierce College, Shoreline Community College, Spokane Community College, Tacoma Community College, University of Washington, University of Washington-Bothell, University of Washington-Tacoma, Western Washington University, Whatcom Community College
Oregon: George Fox University, Oregon State University, Portland Community College, Portland State University, Southern Oregon University, Warner Pacific College, Western Oregon University
Idaho: Host site(s) not identified yet – Contact Stefanie Boyer, stefanie.boyer@wwu.edu or 360-650-6476 for more information.
Washington Campus Compact (WACC) has been awarded a 3-year grant to administer the Students in Service (SIS) AmeriCorps program. The Corporation for National and Community Service (CNCS) has awarded WACC with a 50% increase in the size of the SIS program. his increase will satisfy the growth needs of our current campus partners in Washington, Idaho, Nevada, California, Oregon, Hawaii, and the US Territories of Guam, American Samoa, and Saipan as well help Washington Campus Compact expand its program in 12 new states that include Oklahoma, Texas, Florida, Mississippi, Louisiana, South Carolina, New Hampshire, Maryland, Ohio, Illinois, Minnesota, and West Virginia.
The new grant will also expand our goals to include new initiatives to engage more Veterans entering college and universities to serve their local communities by enrolling in the SIS program and we will concentrate our administrative efforts in increasing the organization capacity of over 1,200 non-profits, schools, and other government agencies through Students in Service members serving at their sites.
With the expansion of the SIS program and our new program goals, we are happy to announce the hiring of a new SIS Grant Manager, Craig Deforest. Craig is currently our VISTA Leader and has done a tremendous job, working with our VISTA Grant Manager Linnea Broker, in significantly improving the administration and impact of our VISTA program. I am fully confident Craig will bring his energy, creative problem solving, and strong communication skills into his new position as the SIS Manager and bring our program to a new level. Craig will begin as SIS Grant Manager on August 21st. I will remain overseeing the program as the Director of Programs and Operations and will initially be working with our new Campus Compacts in establishing the SIS program in their state.
The Students in Service program has also hired a Veterans Student Initiative intern, Mike Brenaman, for the next three quarters. Mike is currently a junior at Western Washington University and is majoring in Human Services. Mike has a strong interest in veteran issues and is a veteran himself. Mike will be creating a list of all the Veteran Student Directors/Coordinators at all of our participating campus partners and will contact them to educate them about the SIS program and how veterans can enroll in the program. Mike can be reached at SISvets@wwu.edu.
This past quarter, Washington Campus Compact’s VISTA team has shown its strength, maximizing its 2,240 hours of indirect service to many times more in volunteer direct service hours. With three quarters of the service year complete, VISTA members are well-versed and practiced in the field of service-learning and are engaging students and faculty in service geared toward poverty alleviation, resulting in notable accomplishments for communities and valuable learning for students.
Leah Congdon, a VISTA serving at Whatcom Community College has brought service-learning into the spotlight at Whatcom with the formation of an active Service-Learning Club. Most recently, she has worked in collaboration with a local non-profit, Whatcom Literacy Council, to develop a tutoring program for Adult Basic Education and English as Second Language students. Because of tuition differences between ABE-ESL classes and college-level classes, students in these programs are not eligible for free one-on-one tutoring on campus.
Four students have been trained and matched with an ABE/ESL student for the pilot project. To facilitate reflection among the tutors, Leah developed a Moodle group (an on-line teaching tool used frequently with Whatcom courses and clubs) in which weekly reflection questions are posted, tutors share their challenges with one another, seek advice, and can access tutoring resources provided by the Literacy Council. Growth is expected next year, and they are currently looking at ways to incorporate a more formal reflection process.
Other VISTA members have recently been involved in celebrating the accomplishments of the community-campus partnerships they help to facilitate. Many WACC VISTAs attended, in support of fellow VISTA, Shannon Smith, University of Washington’s Celebration of Service, where students shared their stories of community involvement through visual displays and conversations. Western Washington University, the host for VISTA Beth Parker, held a Service-Learning Showcase with attendance and presentations from community partners, students, and faculty - also attended by several VISTA team members.
It is this willingness and ability of WACC VISTA team members to network and share best practices which has taken the program to the next level. We are excited to be recruiting for next year’s team, and pleased to announce four current members have signed on to continue fighting poverty through service-learning for a second year.
We would like to recognize Shannon Smith (University of Washington) and Kaelyn Caldwell (Shoreline Community College) for their successful completion of two terms of VISTA service with Washington Campus Compact. Their passion and commitment has transformed the lives of students and community members, increased the capacity of local community organizations, and given higher education a civic purpose. Thank you.
As VISTA Leader, this year has been a valuable professional experience for me and I am proud to have served among such a talented group of individuals. I am pleased to be continuing as Grant Manager of Washington Campus Compact’s Students in Service Program upon the completion of my term of service in August, and happy to be settling in the Pacific Northwest!
Let me tell you a story about Ava Munson, one of the first service-learning students we ever had here at Shoreline Community College in the Fall of 2008.
In Ava’s first quarter at Shoreline Community College (which was also my first quarter as a WACC VISTA member), she was enrolled in a new service-learning course that engaged students in service with residents at a local retirement home. Since the students were taking an American Government course during the run-up to the presidential election, we found residents who were interested in discussing American politics with the students, past and present. Ava ended up being paired with a woman who was an active member of the Black Panthers during the ‘60’s. Ava’s meetings with Samira combined with the active reflection required for the course provided her with new insights about what it means to be socially and politically active; it gave her a stronger sense of community on campus; she found on-campus mentors as a result of the greater intimacy a service-learning course can provide; and it led her to drink the ‘service-learning kool-aid’.
Subsequently, we invited her to participate in Dialogues for Democracy at the Continuums of Service Conference, and encouraged her to pursue the Student Government position of Minister of Social Justice because of its strong connection to service-learning. Then, as Minister of Social Justice, she represented the student voice in the writing process for a grant aimed at funding the development of service-learning activities/courses focused on closing educational opportunity gaps; she helped to coordinate and implement the first ever Martin Luther King, Jr. Day of Service Project in which over 150 students collected 26,000+ pounds of food in one day; she established a campus chapter of Amnesty International which collaborated closely with the Center for Service-Learning to prepare hot meals for a local tent city, while also focusing on the collection and dissemination of information to campus constituents about local, state, and national policies and practices facing students who are undocumented.
Then, Ava was nominated for the All-State Academic Team for Community Colleges, which requires the submission of several letters of recommendation. Since one of the main criterion for the All-State Academic Team was service, she asked me to write her a letter of recommendation that was focused primarily on her commitment to serving the community, both on-campus and off. This clearly wasn’t a difficult endeavor considering her aforementioned record. The rest was history. All of sudden, she had been selected as one of two Shoreline Community College students to represent our college on the All-State Academic Team. Then, she was named Washington State’s one and only New Century Scholar. Then, she was selected to USA Today’s All-USA Community College Academic Team (only 20 students in the nation get this). Then, from this group of 20, she was selected to be one of six students who got to meet with Melinda Gates and other influential members from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. During this meeting, the students were asked to highlight aspects of their community college experience that contributed to their success. And guess what?! Ava discussed service-learning as the single-most important factor in her success as a student. With Melinda Gates.
To me, this story captures the realized potential of service-learning. It demonstrates that service-learning, when practiced well, has the capacity to be transformative—for students and for our communities. It shows that service-learning, when structured as an integral part of the curriculum (whether inside or outside of the classroom), allows students to build their social capital, which is often sorely lacking in this day and age. It exemplifies that service-learning, practiced with the mind-set that students have valuable knowledge and skills, can contribute to the development of leaders who put social justice at the forefront of their life objectives instead of profit. And finally, it illustrates that service-learning, when practiced intentionally, has the capacity to expand a student’s sphere of influence—so much so that they become the champions of service-learning.
In what ways are students and faculty involved in service and service-learning across WA State? How do institutional structures, campus cultures, and the involvement of community partners support their continued engagement? Do campuses have mechanisms to systematically track and assess their community engagement efforts? Campus Compact conducted its annual survey during fall 2009 to explore these questions nationally across higher education institutions.
Twenty-six (26) Washington Campus Compact member campuses participated in the survey, yielding a 74% response rate (far above the 58% national response rate). Thanks to your time and effort, we are able to access and share the state-specific findings of this important survey over a series of three Synergy articles. The first article described the overall nature of community service, service-learning, and civic engagement across the state. The focus of this second article of the series is student involvement in community service, service-learning, and civic engagement, as well as campus expectations for student learning and development, across colleges and universities in WA State.
What learning outcomes do campuses expect their students to achieve? Approximately two-thirds of responding campuses reported inclusion of the following three student outcomes in their institutional strategic plans: service to local, national, and global communities; student civic engagement; and education for global citizenship. Additionally, respondents identified the following essential learning outcomes—which are addressed in the Association of American Colleges and Universities’ Liberal Education and America’s Promise (LEAP) Initiative—as components of their campuses’ strategic plans: critical thinking (90%), intercultural knowledge and competence (71%), and civic knowledge and engagement (67%).
Although the national survey was not designed to measure actual student outcomes, Washington Campus Compact has found that, of its 2008-2009 in-state Students in Service members, 93% experienced increased awareness of critical community needs and issues, 92% reported improved ability to think critically about these community needs and issues, and 95% reported better understanding of how to use their knowledge and skills to improve communities. Additionally, in relation to intercultural knowledge and competence, understanding of human differences and commonalities improved for 93% of Students in Service members, and 87% became more aware of their own biases and prejudices.
What opportunities with potential to facilitate essential student learning outcomes exist? College students across WA are presented with a wealth of opportunities to become involved in service to their communities, including course enrollment and co-curricular activities. Of responding campuses, an average of 48 service-learning courses were offered during the 2008-2009 academic year per campus. One-day service projects, non-profit internships/practica, service- and engagement-focused learning communities, and international service activities were among the most common programs offered by responding campuses. Furthermore, campuses reported involving students in leadership opportunities such as recruiting their peers (84% of responding campuses) and acting as liaisons to community sites (64% of responding campuses).
We encourage you to take a moment to review the 2009 Washington Campus Compact Service Statistics: Part Two report (insert link) that details the WA-specific survey findings outlined in this second article of the series. We also encourage you to join your colleagues in using this data in upcoming conversations with campus and community stakeholders, as well as in your strategic and program-specific planning. Almost all (91%) of WACC campus representatives who participated in the survey reported an intent to share survey data with on-campus contacts. More than two-thirds (73%) of your colleagues across the state intend to use the data to inform strategic planning, and over half (59%) plan to share the data with relevant community contacts.
Please contact RaeLyn Axlund with any questions about the 2009 Campus Compact Membership Survey, or to discuss any of WACC’s research and assessment initiatives (e.g., WACC’s College Student Civic Engagement Survey, Faculty Engagement Survey Project, Statewide Capacity Assessment Project).
516 High Street, MS 5291, Bellingham, WA 98225-5996 phone 360.650.7312 fax 360.650.6895 email