Home » ACM Awards $133,000 to Help Institutionalize Community-Based Pedagogies

ACM Awards $133,000 to Help Institutionalize Community-Based Pedagogies

ACM Awards $133,000 to Help Institutionalize Community-Based Pedagogies February 10, 2023

Above: At a workshop last summer, ACM faculty and staff shared information about the place community-based pedagogies currently occupy on ACM campuses and discussed ideas and aspirations for more broadly institutionalizing them.

The Associated Colleges of the Midwest has awarded $133,000 in funding to support nine collaborative, faculty- and staff-led projects designed to institutionalize community-based pedagogies at liberal arts colleges.

The projects are the second component of ACM’s three-pronged Collaboration to Institutionalize High-Impact Practices in the Liberal Arts, funded by the Arthur Vining Davis Foundations. The initiative aims to identify the best practices for high-impact teaching in the liberal arts and understand how colleges can institutionalize these to maximize student learning.

“ACM is grateful to the Arthur Vining Davis Foundations for its support of these important projects and the ACM’s broader effort to institutionalize community-based pedagogies in the liberal arts,” said Brian Williams, Vice President for Strategic Initiatives. “These projects will enable dedicated groups of faculty and staff on the ACM campuses to identify sustainable ways residential liberal arts colleges can enhance these practices on their campuses in ways that advance teaching and learning while also benefitting their community partners.”

Jump to Funded Projects

In the first phase, ACM colleges inventoried their current undergraduate research, community-based learning, and community-based research activities and surveyed faculty perceptions about them. There was broad agreement about successful undergraduate research programs, but the same was not true for community-based learning or research. ACM then hosted a workshop where faculty and staff shared information about the place community-based pedagogies currently occupy on ACM campuses and discussed ideas and aspirations for more broadly institutionalizing them, which generated various collaborative project ideas.

In October 2022, ACM launched the collaborative project funding phase, inviting project ideas from ACM faculty and staff interested in enhancing the stature and place of these community-based pedagogies on and across ACM campuses. A steering committee invited select teams to submit full proposals and ultimately chose to fund nine projects. Project awards may be used to support the resources necessary to initiate, conduct, disseminate, and help institutionalize the activities and results of projects.

In the initiative’s final phase, in 2024, ACM will host a summative conference for faculty to share the curricular and structural outcomes from their projects and set strategies for institutionalizing practices across ACM colleges and disseminating findings broadly.

Funded Projects

The Learning Stance: Expanding Community-Based Learning Pedagogies across the Student Experience (Beloit College)

  • Project Leader: Donna Oliver (Martha Peterson Chair for Distinguished Faculty Service; Director for Community-Based Learning)
  • Grant Amount: $14,976

Establishing a Prison Learning Initiative at Coe College (Coe College)

  • Project Leader: Gina Hausknecht (John William King Professor of Literature and Creative Writing, English Department)
  • Grant Amount:$15,350

Leveraging the Expertise of Registrars: Building an Interdepartmental Network to Support Community Engaged Learning in the ACM (Grinnell College)

  • Project Leaders: Susan Sanning (Associate Dean and Director of Service and Social Innovation); Catherine Ashton (Registrar)
  • Grant Amount:$10,000

Neighbors Supporting Neighbors: Building Institutional Capacity for Community-Based Learning at Knox and Monmouth Colleges (Knox and Monmouth Colleges)

  • Project Leaders: Lori Walters-Kramer (Associate Professor of Communications Studies) and Kathleen Ridlon (Associate Professor of Dance; Director of Kleine Center for Community Service)
  • Grant Amount:$18,280

Assets as Pedagogy: Waukegan School District and Lake Forest College Teacher and Community Project (Lake Forest College)

  • Project Leader: Desmond Odugu (Associate Professor and Chair of Education)
  • Grant Amount: $13,250

Beyond Access: Exploring Inter-Departmental Partnership in Higher Education and Career Opportunities- Legacy Barber College and Lake Forest College (Lake Forest College)

  • Project Leader: Desmond Odugu (Associate Professor and Chair of Education)
  • Grant Amount: $12,500

Serve to Learn: Lake County Service-Learning Directory and Catalogue of Resources Project (Lake Forest College)

  • Project Leader: Dawn Abt-Perkins (Professor of Education; Associate Dean of the Faculty for Student Success)
  • Grant Amount:$20,000

Mapping a Course to Institutionalize Community-Based Learning at Lawrence (Lawrence University)

  • Project Leader: Deanna Donohoue (Associate Professor of Chemistry)
  • Grant Amount: $7,910

From Framework to Proof of Concept: Developing Support for a Director of Community-Based Learning at Luther College (Luther College)

  • Project Leader: Kate Elliott (Associate Dean and Director of CELT)
  • Grant Amount: $14,627
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