Engaged Scholar Workshops are customized sessions designed to help University of Minnesota faculty take advantage of the benefits of publicly-engaged scholarship within their disciplines.
Workshops combine discussions with presentations and hands on exercises to explore ideas and best practices specific to community-engaged research and teaching. The Office for Public Engagement’s faculty development staff will create a workshop customized to your department’s needs.
For details, contact David Weerts, Faculty Director for Academic Planning and Programs, at [email protected]
Topics include:
- Increasing the Impact of Research Through Public Engagement This workshop uses interactive discussion and case scenarios to highlight the ways that public engagement can increase the rigor and impact of research. The workshop focuses on the benefits of and strategies for partnering with communities at different stages of the research cycle, as well as ethical principles for community-engaged research. Scenarios will focus on responding to community concerns about research, and designing a research process that engages community stakeholders. An overview of engagement resources and initiatives at the University of Minnesota is provided.
- Fundamentals of Community-Engaged Teaching and Learning This session provides an overview of different models and strategies for community-engaged teaching and learning. Topics addressed include how to develop reciprocal relationships with communities, how to prepare students for engaged learning, and how to help students harvest learning from their experiences. Participants will learn about the services the Community Service-Learning Center (soon to be renamed the Center for Community-Engaged Learning) provides to support faculty developing and teaching community-engaged learning courses and to departments seeking to increase community engagement in their curricula.
- Developing and Applying Partnership Principles This workshop uses the "Principles of Partnership" developed by the Community-Campus Partnerships for Health as a springboard for discussion about the principles that need to be in place to guide the development and implementation of effective community-campus partnerships. By the end of the workshop, participants will develop a list of partnership principles that fit the needs and work of their particular unit and discuss how to use the principles to navigate challenges in community-university partnerships.
- Community-Engaged Scholarship in Promotion and Tenure How do faculty who engage in community-based research and teaching make their best case for promotion and/or tenure? This workshop will identify the challenges community-engaged scholars face in the promotion and tenure process and present several strategic and practical approaches to addressing these challenges.
- Learning Community A learning community is a format for professional development in which group members pool their combined knowledge and experience to create new learning. Learning communities can be particularly effective if group members are working on a particular project (e.g., integrating service-learning into core required courses), or to frame a particular question of interest (e.g., what is the best way to fully integrate community-engaged research into our implementation of tenure and promotion guidelines?). The Office for Public Engagement staff can help to co-facilitate or serve as resource people for learning communities.
- Securing Philanthropic Support Higher education philanthropists often invest in institutions and programs that are making a clear contribution to society. This interactive workshop explores how departmental leaders and engaged scholars can work with collegiate development officers to secure philanthropic support for engaged teaching, research, and service. Drawing on current scholarship in the areas of engagement, philanthropy, and alumni relations, participants will learn about strategies for boosting private support to achieve departmental and collegiate engagement goals.
For details, contact David Weerts at [email protected].