What is the Community of Practice Experience?
The community of practice cohort will meet 2x each quarter (meetings 1-2 hours in length) to do some communal reflection, collective problem-solving, and knowledge-sharing on the unique challenges and opportunities of doing community engagement work as a graduate student. Each meeting session will be co-created by participants with support from facilitators. Participating graduate students will have the opportunity to co-lead a discussion at least once.
At the culmination of their year together, the community of practice will share their learning through a public forum with the DU community. The structure and format of this forum will be determined by the community of practice. Participants will also submit a written reflection with the option to have it published in a special issue of CCESL’s Public Good Impact.
Who Can Join?
Graduate students at any stage of their community-engagement journey, from early project development to writing up, are encouraged to join! To ensure that all participants have a foundational knowledge of community-engaged methods, all participants will complete an asynchronous training module before the first meeting.
What is Community Engagement?
Community-engaged methods differ from approaches that emphasize one-way applications of academic expertise to community problems. Community engagement is a method, a strategic approach to teaching, scholarship (research, creative work) and service to address public problems through collaborative community partnerships, where community partners are involved in proposal and project development, that:
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Are reciprocal, mutually beneficial
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Share risk, benefit, responsibility
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Can be local, national, and/or global
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With diverse entities (e.g., non-profit, government, private sector)
