Given the wealth of CLI experience on campus, we began a series of faculty workshops to compare similar CLI outreach methods across departments and to have active exchanges with our community partners.  The first of these was held in collaboration with TCCTR, the Public Policy and Law Program, and the Human Rights Program in April of 2005, as a half day workshop entitled Pedagogies of the Real World: Advocacy and Public Awareness.   Trinity faculty panelists Suzanne Gleason from economics, Alta Lash from TCN and sociology, and Dan Lloyd from the Tutorial College and philosophy were joined by Trinity students Narin Prum ’06 and Jason Galant ’05 and community partners Meredith Miller from the State Treasurer’s Office and David Fink from the Partnership for Strong Communities. Panelists discussed the benefits that accrue to faculty, students and the community from creating new audiences for student work.  Such audiences include community groups, policy makers and the general public.  Methods presented to reach them included letters to the editor, policy memos, advocacy projects, white papers, and media campaigns.  A selection of the recommended readings, handouts, and relevant CLI syllabi are listed on the CLI website at:

/UG/UE/CLI/FacultyDevlmntWorkshop.htm

Trinity Institute on Urban Learning and Action

The College hosted its second Institute on Urban Learning and Action, with an emphasis on creating and sustaining partnerships between academic institutions and their surrounding communities. Travelling from as far away as Arizona and California, 38 conferees representing 10 college-community partnerships learned how to strengthen and sustain those partnerships. Trinity faculty and administrators led workshops on Pedagogy (Judy Dworin and Jim Trostle); Evaluation (Carlos Espinosa); and Translating Colleges to the Community (Alta Lash and Elly Jacobson). Barbara Henriques spoke about identifying community links that enhance classroom learning, Jackie Mandyck  (OCIR) and Luis Caban of SINA spoke about community development, Beth Rose (HSP) and Kate Steinway of the CT Historical Society spoke about the Hartford Studies Project, and Joe Barber met with student participants.  The Institute was funded through registration fees as well as funds from the Kellogg Foundation.

Wesleyan University Conference

Jim Trostle and Elly Jacobson were invited to participate in a small meeting with eight other colleges and universities, entitled “What Works and Doesn’t? A Conference for Service-Learning Faculty and Directors”. Both contributed papers to the conference: What Works and What Doesn’t With Community Partners (Trostle) and What Works and What Doesn’t With Faculty (Jacobson).

Campus Compact New England Conference

Elly Jacobson was joined by Debra Borrero of the Office of Community and Institutional Relations and Narin Prum ’06, to participate in a panel entitled “Creative Tensions in Building the Engaged Campus.” The panelists addressed community collaborations and economic development, student volunteer projects and community building, and academic projects and community building.

CLI Course Development Grants

Four course development grants were awarded in the spring of 2005.  They were given to: Luis Figueroa for a first year focus class entitled “The Streets and I: Documentary Film and Urban Life;” to Tom Thornton for a first year seminar entitled “Guns, Butter and Globalization;” to Andrea Dyrness for “Latinos in Education: Local Realities and Transnational Perspectives;” and to Eric Galm for “Ethnomusicology Methods.”

Administrative support for CLI

The College is winding up two longstanding projects with major funders this year, the Atlantic Philanthropies (AP) and the Kellogg Foundation. AP was instrumental in integrating community learning across the disciplines: over six years it provided development grants for over 50 courses, sponsored a conference entitled “Creative Partnerships in the Liberal Arts,” underwrote an evaluation of CLI, provided resources to community organizations for intensive collaborations with Trinity faculty and students, and partially funded the administrative costs to support all of these projects. The Kellogg Foundation also supported many initiatives, including the Trinity Institutes on Urban Learning and Action (described above), many academic collaborations between the Learning Corridor and the College, and other collaborative community initiatives. Kellogg also partially funded administrative support for CLI. The college will continue funding CLI administrative support out of the operating budget for the 2005-06 academic year.

Coordinator for School Partnerships

Barbara Henriques, Visiting Assistant Professor of Educational Studies, has just completed her first year in a dual appointment as Coordinator for School Partnerships, bringing greater oversight and academic support to the many collaborations that Trinity faculty and students enjoy with the Hartford School system. Barbara provides school contacts and advice for our faculty, helps students design and implement appropriate school-based tutoring and mentoring projects, and maintains contacts with top administrators at the Hartford Board of Education.

Evaluation

Alan Bloomgarden, a PhD candidate at UMASS/Amherst, and

KerryAnn O’Meara, an Assistant Professor of Education there, completed a study of Trinity faculty members who have taught CLI courses or been otherwise involved in teaching about Hartford.  In addition to a paper now under review at the Journal of Higher Education, Bloomgarden and O’Meara have presentations on this and their prior study of Trinity scheduled at the American Educational Research Assocation and the Association for the Study of Higher Education.

A Sample of Community Learning Courses 2004-05

“Guns, Butter and Globalization” (First Year Seminar) Tom

Thornton

Thornton’s students explored how states have long had to prioritize their spending, choosing between domestic programs (“butter”) and military expenditures (“guns”). The community learning project was designed to provide opportunities for students to engage in aspects of globalization in the context of greater Hartford’s own local food and weapons economies. In addition to field trips to local food and weapons institutions, students investigated key aspects of the local and global food systems in such areas as community gardens, farmers markets, farmland preservation and supermarket pricing. The present Chartwell’s initiative at Trinity to serve locally-grown produce is one outcome of this seminar.

Children, Child Development and Children’s Rights (First Year Seminar and Colloquium) Dina Anselmi

This seminar and second semester colloquium built upon a prior collaboration with the Hartford Middle Magnet School at the

Learning Corridor.  Anselmi paired her students with an 8th grade class to explore issues of children’s rights such as child labor, child soldiers, student drug testing, and child runaways.  They prepared poster presentations for a Children’s Rights Day held at Trinity and attended by all 8th graders from the middle school as well as members of the Trinity community. In this fashion, Trinity students helped their 8th grade partners develop projects that these students later taught to their own peers.  The Kellogg Foundation provided funding for video documentation of the project.

Arts and Community (Interarts Program) Claire Rossini

This course helps students learn that art can directly engage a community's values, struggles, and aspirations.  Readings came from artists from around the globe who are actively involved in the community cultural development movement.  Students enrolled in the course became members of the Broad Street Arts Collective, a program created by InterArts to enhance college connections to neighborhood arts organizations and artists. Trinity students worked with local artists and with students at the Learning Corridor Magnet Montessori School to create a "neighborhood arts celebration" featuring visual artwork, music, and food from local restaurants.

Advisory Group

CLI is guided by an advisory group that includes:

Joe Barber                                            Stefanie Chambers

Jack Dougherty                                     Hebe Guardiola-Diaz

David Henderson                                   Anne Lambright

Dan Lloyd                                            Theresa Morris

For more information contact:

Jim Trostle                                            Elly Jacobson

McCook 200 x2564                          Williams 225 x4275

James.Trostle@trincoll.edu               Elinor.Jacobson@trincoll.edu

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