The process of assessing and benchmarking community engagement can take many forms. To date, more than two dozen assessment tools for measuring community engagement institutionalization have been published. These tools vary substantially in purpose, level of complexity, scope, process, structure, and focus. While some instruments are designed to…

This study explored university-community collaborations by examining the workings of 1 healthy marriage initiative. An ethnographic case study research strategy was used to study the process of this initiative, specifically looking at how participants worked through and overcame traditional university-community collaboration challenges. Data…

There are increasing pressures for universities to commercialise their research and increase their contributions to their local and regional environments. For those institutions located in areas of low demand, this can lead to a low-impact equilibrium of universities working with external partners, and having relatively low impact. In such…

Learning consists of all the ways that youth acquire new knowledge, skills, values, and behaviors. It happens not just in school, but also through afterschool and summer activities, time spent with the family, and increasingly, through interaction with digital media. Broadening ideas about where, when, and how learning happens helps communities to…

The persistent failure of public schooling in low-income communities constitutes one of our nation's most pressing civil rights and social justice issues. Many school reformers recognize that poverty, racism, and a lack of power held by these communities undermine children's education and development, but few know what to do about it. "A…

Humanity is facing problems on a scale never before encountered. This dissertation traces the roots of modern culture's destructive relationship to the planet with its habits of over-consumption and exceeding the limits of the planet's ecological systems. Educational institutions are embedded in and replicate an unsustainable culture. As…

When the deepwater horizon offshore oil drilling rig exploded in the Gulf of Mexico in April 2010, 11 crewmen were killed; the accident led to the largest oil spill in U.S. history. Forty workers on the rig managed to escape the catastrophe, thanks largely to a safety-training program they had taken at community colleges in the Louisiana Community…

Career and technical education (CTE) is starting to turn green. Due to a host of reports, research, workforce initiatives, and scholarly speaking engagements, it is evident that higher education and workforce consultants recognize the need for today's students to gain exposure to sustainability or green career pathways. But for secondary and…

By offering open-source software (OSS)-based networks as an affordable technology alternative, we partnered with a nonprofit community organization. In this article, we narrate the client-based experiences of this partnership, highlighting the ways in which OSS and open-source culture (OSC) transformed our students' and our own expectations of…

The programs of the Rutgers' Center for Family Involvement in Schools create a partnership for learning between families and schools that promotes and enhances academic success. They also create a powerful school climate that demonstrates respect, trust, and belonging. In addition to teacher-training programs, the center conducts summer leadership…

Project "Green Footprint" is a local community environment project created by fifth-grade students to remind the citizens of their school (and Earth) to tread lightly on Mother Nature's creations. The students chose to focus on the air quality outside the school, specifically the carbon emissions produced by idling cars. Students complete Internet…

It may seem something of a paradox that in a globalised age where notions of interdependence, interconnectedness and common destinies abound, the "local", with its diversity of cultures, languages, histories and geographies, continues to exercise a powerful grip on the human imagination. The ties that bind us have global connections but…

This article describes the author's reflections on a service-learning course at Penn State Lehigh Valley, a campus of The Pennsylvania State University. The author provides background about the university, the community need, and the service-learning course. Reflections from assessing two semesters of the service-learning course are provided.

This article offers a dialogic engagement with Fielding & Moss's "Radical Education and the Common School" (2011). First, the author puts forward a critical and reflective narrative on the process in the London Borough of Waltham Forest to create a strategic children and young people plan, which she cautiously proposes is an attempt…

The National Institute on Aging created the Resource Centers for Minority Aging Research (RCMARs) to address infrastructure development intended to reduce health disparities among older adults. The overall goals of the RCMARs are to (a) increase the size of the cadre of researchers conducting research on issues related to minority aging; (b)…