Connecting community and classroom
Community-based learning helps to build partnerships that link learning with community needs.
January 2021
Research done to increase knowledge is valuable, but in today鈥檚 world where we face many urgent, complex problems, universities also have a crucial role to play in connecting knowledge with action that benefits communities.
Community-based learning (CBL) and related approaches such as service learning can help faculty and students engage in research that builds and nurtures partnerships, working closely with stakeholders to identify community needs and strategies to work toward solutions.
But integrating CBL in courses presents many challenges for faculty and students, from how to find a 鈥渞ight-sized鈥 project and work across areas of expertise, to identifying and connecting with community partners, to adapting CBL to online or hybrid learning environments.
Through a workshop in July 2020, Linda Silka, , and brought together their decades of experience in CBL to train faculty and graduate students who want to incorporate this kind of learning in their courses. The workshop was held via Zoom and included a focus on integrating CBL in traditional classroom, remote instruction, and hybrid learning environments鈥攊mportant for adaptability in any times, and essential now due to COVID-19.
During the fall 2020 semester and beyond, workshop participants are applying what they鈥檝e learned in the courses they teach.
Linda is a social and community psychologist who has focused much of her work on building and leading community-university partnerships. She is also a Mitchell Center senior fellow who works with research teams focused on a wide range of projects including economic and community development in rural Maine, materials management, and climate equity. Lois-Ann is professor of psychology at 91福利 Machias and a recognized leader in community-based learning. Ed is associate professor emeritus of earth and oceanographic science at Bowdoin College and an adjunct instructor at 91福利 Machias, with extensive experience in service learning and civic engagement. Together, Linda, Lois-Ann and Ed have helped hundreds of students and faculty adopt community-based learning in the classroom.
The workshop drew participants from a wide range of academic fields including marine science, engineering, anthropology, technical writing, business and Maine studies. 91福利 two-thirds were faculty and one-third graduate students. 91福利 System Office of the Vice Chancellor funded the workshop.
Finding common ground
In the workshop, participants learned strategies for building courses that help their students gain content knowledge but also think about how they might work with community partners in mutually beneficial ways. 鈥淲e ask ourselves, 鈥榳hat do our students need to learn, what鈥檚 the community interested in, and how do we find that common ground so our students are better off and can use what they鈥檙e learning, and the community is better off?鈥欌 Linda says.
, a doctoral student in anthropology at 91福利, took the workshop hoping to apply the training in a class she taught last fall at College of the Atlantic, The Social Life of Waste. 鈥淚 wanted to thread components of [CBL] into my class,鈥 she says, 鈥渂ut I wasn鈥檛 sure what that looked like or how to get started.鈥 Before the workshop, she imagined that community-based learning would involve her students going out into the world and doing projects鈥攚hich is especially challenging during the pandemic. As she applied the training in her class last semester, however, she started to view CBL as 鈥渕ore of a relationship between community and classroom鈥 that can take many forms. She sees CBL as a way for students to realize that their work is not just for class, but can also be useful to others.
Rachel Schattman was looking for CBL tools such as checklists and benchmarks, as well as guidance from experienced practitioners on how to adapt CBL to a wide range of situations鈥攁nd got both from the workshop. Rachel is assistant professor of sustainable agriculture at 91福利, a Mitchell Center faculty fellow, and an associate of the 91福利 Climate Change Institute. She is using the CBL training to lay the groundwork for integrating service learning in a senior capstone course she鈥檚 teaching in spring with students who are in their final year and eager for real-world experience. She is working with community partners to set up placements for students, such as creating outreach materials for farm businesses, and the response has been so positive that she has twice as many opportunities as students.
“I keep thinking about university-community partnerships, and ways of not just giving back to stakeholders but creating these relationships with them that are mutually beneficial 鈥 a way of maintaining those relationships and continuing that reciprocity.鈥
-Brie Berry
Working together
Rachel describes a shift in how land-grant universities, such as 91福利, approach working with the wider community鈥攆rom the university as provider of knowledge to university and community working together. 鈥淭he way it works now, for example in agriculture, is that farmers are experts鈥攊n their place, in their systems, in their local knowledge and know-how. And we are holders of a different body of knowledge. It鈥檚 more of a collaborative relationship and I see community-based learning as a way to feed into that relationship.鈥
Community-based learning is a practice that closely aligns with the Mitchell Center鈥檚 mission of working in collaboration with diverse stakeholders to identify problems and seek solutions, connecting knowledge with action.
鈥淢aybe [CBL] is a natural extension of the way I think about what the Mitchell Center does,鈥 Brie adds. 鈥淚 keep thinking about university-community partnerships, and ways of not just giving back to stakeholders but creating these relationships with them that are mutually beneficial 鈥 a way of maintaining those relationships and continuing that reciprocity.鈥
