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January 2009
Long, Meadows and Yousey Travel Abroad for International Global Citizenship Conference
In January 2009, Drs. Kathleen Long, Melody Meadows and Kimberly Yousey traveled to Austria for the Salzburg Global Seminar centered on the practice and integration of international service within travel abroad opportunities. As part of the Mellon Fellow Community Initiative Grant, awarded to Wesleyan in January 2008, the attendees also worked on the GAINS (Global Awareness for Infusing Networks of Service) program that links Wesleyan’s international travel courses with the institution’s new initiative in community engagement to advance its mission of world citizenship. This was the second year that Wesleyan attended the seminar at Salzburg.
2nd Annual Martin Luther King Jr. Service Awards
On January 19, 2009, the WVWC campus community gathered in Wesley Chapel for the 2nd Annual Martin Luther King Jr. ‘Celebration of Service’ to honor those who serve communities local to global, and to celebrate Dr. King’s legacy of social justice. For the past year, the award winners not only engaged in service-related activities, but also research, advocacy, service-learning and social justice projects and events. A list of the winners and their awards can be found on the CCE wiki: 2009 MLK 'Celebration of Service'.
Sustainability Task Force Formed
A task force formed in January to support environmental sustainability issues on Wesleyan's campus and within the Strategic Plan of the college. The task force is represented by faculty, staff and students from various campus departments: Bonner Scholars, Biology, Campus Life, Community Engagement, Dining Services, Environmental Science, Green Club, Housing, Mathematics, Physical Plant, SIFE and the Vice President of Finance. In addition to supporting this institutional initiative, the task force will also be sponsoring campus events to raise awareness about various issues associated with sustainability, such as recycling and conservation of resources. (http://wvwcsustainability.pbwiki.com)
International Service Course Offered to Students
An international service course to Belize has been created for students at Wesleyan for May 2009. Led by Evey Hepinger and Dr. Sue Leight (Nursing), the students will be immersed in the Belizean culture, and will also coordinate and implement a series of programs for the local children. Programming includes an education series on the environment and ecology of Belize, as well as the importance of health and hygiene.
February 2009
Rupp Shares Inauguration Experience to Students
Dr. Robert Rupp (Political Science) was invited by the Wesleyan chapter of RESULTS to speak to a group of students in the Center for Community Engagement about his experience at the inauguration of 44th President Barack Obama. Granted with a press pass, Rupp was able to experience the event on Capitol Hill amongst 1.8 million people - the whole population of West Virginia. Students and staff engaged with Rupp in a discussion about the various aspects surrounding the historical event: the symbolism within the President's speech, the long campaign trail, and the years which lie ahead.
New VISTA Network Formed Within Higher Education
A new network of WV VISTAs formed to support the sustainability of community engagement and service within higher education institutions. These VISTAs support various initiatives and programs, such as service-learning, community-based research, social media and the Bonner program. The network includes the following colleges and universities:
Graduation Requirement Proposed to Curriculum Council
After receiving feedback from individual academic departments, a graduation requirement proposal has been submitted to curriculum council for review. The proposal, which has been presented to individual academic departments, includes a graduation requirement that is fully integrated and works within current curricular standards. This graduation requirement includes each freshman participating in one day of service, as well as the completion of one designated "Community Engagement" (CE) course between their sophomore and senior year. Curriculum Council will review the proposal in late February.
Themed-Year Committee Holds First Meeting
As a response to faculty and staff interest, a committee convened in mid-February to discuss the proposed idea of a rotating themed-year experience at Wesleyan. Every year, all departments and groups on campus, faculty, staff, student and administrative, would be able to design courses, projects and events around a broad theme, such as poverty, the environment, or globalization to name a few. The committee will brainstorm themes and logistics for this campus-wide project, resulting in a proposal to the campus later this spring.
New Wiki Created for Wesleyan Bonners
As part of a new Serve 2.0 initiative adopted by the Bonner Foundation, the Wesleyan Bonner Scholars recently created a wiki to better serve students and the program by making many of their projects and resources available online. Using the wiki, students can submit reflections, connect with other students' blogs, and collaborate on planning documents for various projects and events. (http://wvwcbonner.pbwiki.com)
Learn and Serve Grant Team Formed
A team of Wesleyan students, faculty and staff gathered with the Buckhannon Chapter of Habitat for Humanity for the initial planning of a Learn & Serve grant issued by the Corporation for National and Community Service. The grant will directly meet the needs to Habitat through project coordination, community education and campus volunteer management and will include both curricular and co-curricular opportunities.
Dean of Community Engagement Participates in Chair of Sociology Department Search
Dr. Kimberly Yousey served on the committee to hire a new chair of the Sociology department. The search focuses on finding a candidate with a strong focus on service-learning and will continue the mission of the Institute for Social and Community Research.
VISTA Search Begins for CCE
The Center for Community Engagement announced in February the opening of two VISTA positions beginning this summer 2009. One position will focus on community partner development and the other on faculty and student programming. (For more information, see: http://wvwc.pbwiki.com/VISTA)
March 2009
Wesleyan Professors and Administrators Explore Partnerships in Mexico
During Spring Break 2009, Professor Molly Clark (Sociology), Professor Pete Galarneau (Communications), Dr. Kimberly Yousey (Dean of Community Engagement) and Dr. Larry Parsons (Dean of Academic Affairs) traveled to Mexico to explore possible opportunities for service-related partnerships abroad. The group was able to meet with a number of schools, from elementary to university, to determine what kinds of projects Wesleyan students could help serve and organize.
CCE Awarded $2,000 Serve 2.0 Grant
In March 2009, the Center for Community Engagement was awarded a $2,000 Serve 2.0 grant from the Bonner Foundation to help a local organization become engaged with their community on the web. With the use of social media applications, such as Facebook and YouTube, the grant will support the newly-formed Main Street Arts Co-Op located in downtown Buckhannon, WV. Students will gather video and stories from local artists in Upshur County and post these to various social media outlets to promote the Arts Co-Op. Since the organization is new, the grant will support the initial marketing and public relation needs, and will engage Wesleyan students with the local community. For more information on the national Serve 2.0 initiative, go to http://serve.pbwiki.com/.
CCE Sponsors Faculty Development Series
On March 10, 2009, the Center for Community Engagement held its first sponsored Faculty Development Series event to discuss the fourth bullet of Wesleyan’s mission statement that indicates graduating students will be able to “demonstrate their local and global citizenship through service.” The workshop engaged faculty in a discussion about the differences between “service” and “engagement”, how the institution as a whole can engage students in current issues, and how service-learning can be assessed. Within the next few months, the series will continue the discussion with experiential learning, the use of technology, and course development strategies. The series will conclude in an open retreat for faculty to develop strategies and plans for course integration via community-based research, policy research, direct service-learning, issue-based learning and more.
Learn & Serve Grant Submitted
As mentioned previously in February, a grant for Learn & Serve America was written and submitted in March 2009 to help support local organizations in Upshur County that deal with issues directly affected by the recent economic crisis. The grant, which was expanded in March to include the Upshur County Community Gardens and Main Street Arts Co-Op organizations, will provide support via project coordination, community education and student volunteer management within both curricular and co-curricular opportunities.
April 2009
Rawson Engages Student Development in Social Media
On Monday, April 20, AmeriCorps VISTA Brooke Rawson held an information session on social media use with the Student Development office at WVWC. The session focused on 5 tools that institutions are quickly adopting and utilizing across the US: Facebook, YouTube, Wikis, Google Applications and Twitter. Rawson also informed the group about best practices within social media and how their respective offices could most effectively utilize these tools. The slides from that session have been uploaded to Slideshare - a great online tool for sharing and publishing PowerPoint presentations. To view the presentation, go here. To view a list of examples used within the presentation, go here.
Cale Hired as Community Partner Relations VISTA
In April 2009, the CCE hired Wesleyan senior Bonner Scholar Brandon Cale to serve as the Community Partner Relations VISTA. During Cale's year of VISTA work, he will develop an issues-based model for students working with various community partners. This model will look at various issues (i.e. housing, poverty, children, environment) and coordinate/develop site locations with partners at the local, regional, state, and national levels that are developmentally appropriate for WVWC students. Also during his year, Cale will assist with matching community partner needs with faculty course and research needs, and with various offices and organizations on campus for service-related projects and events.
Planning Begins for the Annual CE Retreat
The CCE began planning for the 3rd Annual CE Retreat, which, in previous years, has served as a time for numerous representatives of the campus and local communities to steer the direction of Wesleyan's community engagement initiative and strategic planning efforts. In a response to faculty interest, the retreat this year will serve as a time to organize and construct service-learning courses through training workshops and course planning sessions. This retreat will also serve as the conclusion of the Faculty Development Series, which has introduced the community engagement initiative and service-learning tools to Wesleyan faculty through a developmental sequence of workshops and information sessions. For the two-day retreat, the CCE will be inviting facilitators that have experience in service-learning pedagogy and course construction to lead the workshops and training sessions.
CE Graduation Requirement Approved by Curriculum Council
The proposal submitted to Curriculum Council in February detailing a CE requirement for all Wesleyan students was officially approved this April. Beginning in the 2010 Fall semester, first-year seminar students will participate in one of eight available Service Days. After their experience in first-year seminar, students will then complete their community engagement requirement at Wesleyan by taking at least one CE-designated course before graduation. Within the proposal, the requirements are intentionally designed to be completely integrated into current practices of the first-year seminar, as well as open for designation within other requirements, such as major/minor and general education requirements. While the requirement will not be instated until Fall 2010, a pilot program for the first year service days will be implemented Fall 2009 with all first-year seminars.
May 2009
Local VISTA Volunteers Participate in Annual AmeriCorps Week
VISTA volunteers Sara Fincham (Stockert Youth Center), Kristi McDaniel (Literacy Volunteers) and Brooke Rawson (CCE) participated in AmeriCorps Week - a week long celebration of the AmeriCorps programs and history. Held May 9-16, the VISTAs gave presentations about AmeriCorps to Wesleyan campus members and the Buckhannon-Upshur High School. As a result of the week's activities, the VISTAs will be organizing a project with local high school students this summer.
Faculty Development Series Continues with Webinar on Engaging Students
On May 7, the CCE sponsored an informational webinar for Wesleyan faculty titled "Engaging the Disengaged Student with Experiential Learning". This session identified ways to improve student engagement in the classroom through explaining the differences between traditional learning environments and experiential learning environments. A cd of the webinar is now available in the Library for those who wish to view it. This was the second event in the Faculty Development Series sponsored by the CCE.
Summer Interns Hired for Serve 2.0 Grant
As detailed in the Serve 2.0 grant proposal, the CCE hired two summer interns to assist in the development of several web-based marketing tools for the Main Street Artist's Co-Op. The interns, Danielle Mullins (Sophomore) and Ben Vandenberg (Senior), will begin their work at the start of June 2009.
June 2009
WVWC Staff and Students Attend 2009 Summer Leadership Institute
From June 3-6, 2009, CCE staff and two Bonner Scholar students attended the 2009 Summer Leadership Institute (SLI) held at Stetson University in Deland, Florida. The conference focused on how students can turn the issues they’re passionate about into measurable impact in their communities. LeeAnn Brown, Evey Hepinger and Brooke Rawson (CCE Staff) collaborated with other Bonner Scholar and Leader schools on specific issue areas, and presented workshops on current initiatives at WV Wesleyan. (See workshop titles below.) Students Elizabeth Gain and Danielle Mullins represented WVWC as Bonner Congress Representatives, networking and collaborating with other college and university Reps on national issues, such as Youth Development. Both the CCE staff and students gained a wealth of knowledge and ideas from the experience, which will result in a deeper focus on issues and community impact this coming year. Specifically within Youth Development, students Gain and Mullins will be working with peers to develop a new program that will help Buckhannon-Upshur high school students prepare for college.
Workshops Presented by CCE Staff and WVWC Bonner Scholars:
- Community Gardens: a Project to Promote Sustainability, Food Security, Healthy Living, and Civic Participation – Brooke Rawson (Co-Presenter with 4 other schools)
- Expanding Global Understanding through a Belizean Experience – Evey Hepinger, Elizabeth Gain, Danielle Mullins
- Resources and Opportunities: Growing a Campus Wide Community Engagement Program – LeeAnn Brown, Evey Hepinger, Brooke Rawson
Serve 2.0 Interns Begin Work with Local Artists Co-Op
In early June 2009, Wesleyan students Danielle Mullins and Ben VanDenBerg began implementing a social media marketing plan for the newly-formed Main Street Artists Co-Op. Using sites such as Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube, as well as a personal website, the two summer interns will create a web-presence for the organization that will build a renewed interest for the arts within the surrounding communities. A $2,000 sub-grant from the Bonner Foundation has made the project possible.
Foley Hired as Student/Faculty Programming VISTA
In June 2009, the CCE hired Wesleyan senior Alice Foley to serve as the Student/Faculty Programming VISTA. During Foley's year of service, she will focus on creating opportunities for dialogues around engagement, social issues, and leadership on campus. Specifically, she will work closely with advising student groups such as the Social Justice League, facilitating National Issues Forums, working with Wesleyan’s new Theme year program to help plan curriculum resources, movies series, speakers series, coffe talks and other programs related to the theme. Furthermore, Foley will also work closely with the Student Senate and Greek Organizations to design a student leadership training program that directly relates to service.
Aloi and Brown Attend Sustainability Conference
CCE Staff Meet with New WV Campus Compact Director
On June 22, 2009, CCE staff met with the new director of the WV Campus Compact, Franchesca Nestor, to discuss current partnership opportunities and the new role of the organization within the state. Wesleyan is one of eighteen institutions within WV that partner with the organization. Campus Compact, a national network of state chapters, provides various resources and opportunities for faculty, staff, students and administrators to help promote and engage in service. For more information, please go to http://www.compact.org.
July 2009
CCE Staff Retreat
Social Media Presentation to the WVWC Annie Merner Pfeiffer Library
August/September 2009
Three new VISTAs Start Service:
Recently Wesleyan graduates and newly hired VISTA volunteers Brandon Cale, Alice Foley, and Cassie Lemon started working this month. Cale serves as the liaison between community partners in Buckhannon and the Wesleyan campus. He has been working with the Bonner Scholars to facilitate solid relationships between the Bonners and their main sites. Foley will be spending her time focusing on student and faculty programming, which currently includes the new First Year Service Day initiative, development of a campus leadership program, and facilitation of faculty brown bag lunch discussions to further the Community Engagement initiative. Lemon is a Recovery VISTA and is partnering with Habitat for Humanity to address issues relating to substandard housing in Upshur County. Most recently, Lemon has been working toward the creation of a collegiate chapter of Habitat for Humanity that will be able to partner with the local Buckhannon River Habitat chapter.
Do Good Day at Wesleyan:
In the spirit of John Wesley’s famous quote “Do all the good you can, by all the means you can, in all the ways you can, in all the places you can, at all the times you can, to all the people you can, as long as ever you can,” September 1, 2009 was the first Do Good Day on Wesleyan’s campus. Do Good Day was organized by the Center for Community Engagement and Wesleyan’s Physical Plant. The day gave students, staff and faculty the chance to give back to the campus. Organizers worked closely with representatives from the entire campus to compile a list of that could be completed that day. Activities included weeding, collecting recycling, painting, moving classrooms and washing cars. Another second anuual Do Good Day is scheduled for April 8, 2010.
First Year Service Days:
As part of the new Community Engagement graduation requirement, the Class of 2012 is piloting the First Year Service Day program. The First Year Service Day program fulfills the one-day direct service requirement for graduation. Each student that participates in a day of service participates in a post-service oral reflection about what they accomplished, as well as a written reflection due one week from the date of service. The written reflections are recorded by the Center for Community Engagement and each student will be tracked via their datatel numbers so progress from year to year will be evident. Service sites have included the Stonewall Jackson Jubilee, numerous Upshur County schools, Stonewall Resort, Audra State Park, as well as the Parish House. Throughout the semester 53 different service opportunities have been offered.
National Day of Service Food Drive:
In response to President Obama’s declaration that September 11 be the National Day of Service and Remembrance, a statewide food drive was organized in West Virginia. Coordinated by the Parish House and local Salvation Army, with help from the Center for Community Engagement, Wesleyan was designated as a drop off site. On campus the food drive was turned into a competition amongst the student organizations, academic departments, and the administrative offices. Each group gave as much as possible in order to be rewarded with dessert made by Dean Elsener. The food drive collected more than 500 items that were split between the Parish House and the Salvation Army. The winners from each category were: Alpha Delta Pi Sorority, the Department of Theatre and Dance, and the Physical Plant.
Bonner Focus on Diversity:
During Month of September the Bonner Scholars focused on diversity and how it impacts the lives of others. To talk about the complexities of diversity Dr. Heller, professor of Sociology, was a guest speaker for the Bonner Monthly Meeting and he spoke about how diversity is brought into our everyday lives. Reflections for the month were focused around diversity-related films such as Remember the Titans and Gran Torino, which opened the eyes of the students of how diversity has changed over the course of time. In October, the Bonner’s focus on social justice and what students can do to make a difference in the world.
Operation Christmas Child International Spokesperson Visits Campus:
On September 26th Operation Christmas Child International Spokeswoman Mary Damron spoke at Wesleyan. Damron is a West Virginia native and has travelled the world with Operation Christmas Child. Damron's presentation has "made a life-changing effect on many students" as she travels to colleges, and communities throughout the world. Operation Christmas Child is a program run by Samaritan’s Purse that allows children in extreme poverty experience the simple gift of having a Christmas present.
Community Partner Volunteer Handbook Created:
The community partner handbook is a new resource for both community partners and students. The handbook covers topics such as why service is important, the student developmental model through service, and also the expectations of service. This booklet will serve as a resource to answer common questions as well as provide the contact information for the Center for Community Engagement should there be any questions or concerns. Overall, this book is designed to be a quick reference to service learning for those who are currently and those interested in being community partners with West Virginia Wesleyan College.
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