‘Neighbors Supporting Neighbors’
MONMOUTH, Ill. – A grant to Monmouth and Knox colleges will help both colleges strengthen their ties to their local communities.
The two liberal arts colleges received a grant from the Associated Colleges of the Midwest to work on “Neighbors Supporting Neighbors: Building Institutional Capacity for Community-Based Learning at Knox and Monmouth Colleges.”
The project’s goals are to help faculty use community-based teaching practices in their classes and increase the number of courses that include high-impact community-based teaching practices, which will provide more opportunities for classes to engage with their local community.
“This is an opportune time to heighten awareness of community-engaged learning, reinforce the value of collaboration between student-life staff and academic-affairs personnel, and bring community voices into the conversation.” – Lori Walters-Kramer
“With both colleges expanding their civic engagement staff and new faculty members joining the teaching ranks every year, this is an opportune time to heighten awareness of community-engaged learning, reinforce the value of collaboration between student-life staff and academic-affairs personnel, and bring community voices into the conversation,” said Monmouth communication studies professor Lori Walters-Kramer.
At Monmouth, Walters-Kramer worked on securing the grant along with biology professor Eric Engstrom, educational studies professor Tammy LaPrad, and Wackerle Center for Career, Leadership & Fellowships Director Marnie Dugan.
“The first phase of the grant-funded project will allow us to bring an expert to one of our campuses to provide faculty and staff information about the history, value and best practices of community-based pedagogies,” said Walters-Kramer. “Those of us on the team from Monmouth College hope that faculty in departments that do not currently offer a community-engagement course will be inspired to consider participating in the next phase of the grant-funded project which involves providing faculty who want to develop a community-engagement project a stipend as well as time to workshop their ideas with others.”