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The Morrill Acts of 1862 & 1890 ranted federally controlled land to the states, which states could then sell to fund establishment of “land-grant” colleges in response to demand for practical education for agricultural and industrial workers. Curricula focused on agriculture and technical subjects. An institution's land grant status informs how it engages with its communities (NCSU is a land grant university). -
In the early 20th century, John Dewey wrote a book called Experience in Education wherein he emphasized the importance of experiential and experimental learning opportunities. In the near century since this landmark text, efforts toward community engagement have expanded across K-12, university, and workplace learning environments. -
The Carnegie Foundation launches the Carnegie Classification, which identifies institutions who must meet certain standards to earn the classification. It is unclear when exactly the Community Engagement classification was initiated, but some time before 2006, to be certain.
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Carolyn Miller writes about humanistic rationale for technical writing, prompting writers to investigate how even technical communications are saturated with cultural context, which is never objective. Subsequent texts (Blake Scott, Walton) emphasized the importance of social structures. Universities began teaching not only effective technical writing but the ethics and social contexts of writing. In the 1990s researchers tied these concerns to supporting students as active citizens. -
"A national coalition of 1,000+ colleges and universities committed to the public purposes of higher education. [Universities that] build democracy through civic education and community development.” -
Markus, Howard, and King [21], using procedures that closely approximated a randomized control-group design, found that students in service learning sections had more positive course evaluations, more positive beliefs and values toward service and community, and higher academic achievement as measured on mid- term and final examinations.
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Janet S. Eyler wins the Thomas Ehrlich Faculty Award for Service Learning, describing the field as “a form of experiential education where learning occurs through a cycle of action and reflection as students. . . seek to achieve real objectives for the community and deeper understanding and skills for themselves. Students link personal and social development with academic and cognitive development. Experience enhances understanding; understanding leads to more effective action.” -
Community-based learning refers to a wide variety of instructional methods and programs that educators use to connect what is being taught in schools to their surrounding communities. Community-based learning is also motivated by the belief that all communities have intrinsic educational assets and resources that educators can use to enhance learning experiences for students. Synonyms include community-based education, place-based learning, and place-based education, etc.
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The Swearer Center at Brown University launched a national field-building initiative, which evolved into the College and University Engagement Initiative (CUEI). CUEI contributed to the fields of community engagement and social innovation through collaboration with students, faculty, community partners, institutions of higher education, and networks for community engagement and social innovation. -
Digital service learning (DSL) is a term that Eaton & Leek use to describe community engagement work conducted through digital technologies. It meets the same criteria as traditional service learning in that it follows a learning process that both reflective and reciprocal and committed to collaborative approaches to advancing equity and social justice (e.g., Furco, 1996). Presentation: https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1R_-kfRHpPzF-iPh1_F59WZycLV3K1pqNhXXIpERKwgw/edit#slide=id.p