For Faculty

Community Engaged (CE) Curriculum

CE Curriculum, funded by the Mellon Foundation through the Community-Engaged Intensives in the Humanities grant, aims to foster and support the development of courses that cultivate long-lasting, equitable collaborations between our campus and communities of the city of Poughkeepsie, Dutchess County, and the Hudson Valley. Faculty across academic disciplines are invited to reach out to the OCEL to connect about various community partner projects.

Community-Engaged Courses and Intensives are envisioned as innovative, collaborative learning opportunities that complement more traditional courses by extending beyond the classroom. Faculty are invited to develop community-engaged curriculum to fit their own areas of teaching, to respond to student interests and project proposals, and to address specific community needs and opportunities.

How the OCEL can connect to your Community Partnership Course or Intensive

1. Course Design & Pedagogical Support
   • Aligning community engagement with liberal arts curriculum goals (critical thinking, critical analysis of social issues, interdisciplinarity, civic learning).
   • Syllabus consultation to embed community-based inquiry, reflective practice, and experiential learning.
     
2. Partnership Development rooted in Place-Based Justice
   • Facilitating equitable and reciprocal partnerships with local community organizations that align with course themes.
   • Supporting sustainable, trust-based relationships with attention to the inherent power dynamics present within community-campus work.
   • Guidance on co-creating mutually beneficial projects that respond to community-identified inquiries, needs, and tasks.
     
3. Logistical Coordination and Financial Administration
   • Assistance with transportation, including college vans, local transit options, or OCEL drivers.
   • Support navigating the Workday process.
   • Support with reimbursement or honorarium payments to community collaborators.
     
4. Student Preparation & Mentorship
   • Co-facilitating or leading trainings and workshops on responsible community engagement, anti-oppression, and centering community voice.
   • Providing peer mentors and office hours to support students navigating real-world complexities.
     
5. Reflection, Evaluation, and Scholarly Integration
   • Support for assessing student learning and community impact through qualitative, narrative-based approaches.
   • Facilitating faculty learning communities and circles around community-based teaching.
   • Brainstorm avenues for community-engaged conference presentations or publications on engaged pedagogy

CEL as a Faculty Sponsor

Community-Engaged Learning (CEL #290) is a community-based educational opportunity aimed to enhance learning through employing pedagogical strategies of structured critical reflection, dialogic engagement, integration of academic learning goals, and connection to clearly articulated community-desired outcomes and impact. In the CEL experience, students learn more about social issues, work alongside community partners, combine their off-campus learning with guided reflection under the mentorship of a faculty sponsor, and participate in critical community-engaged learning on-campus workshops.

Faculty Sponsors will:

• Mentor students within community-based partnerships that align with their teaching, research, and/or community commitments
• Assess how the community-based work will contribute to the student’s academic program
• Co-create and assign an academic framework to complement the community-based work
• Evaluate the student’s performance

Information For Faculty booklet—Academic Year

Community-Based Research & Engaged Research

The OCEL will support faculty interested in Community-Based Research (CBR)/Engaged Research. CBR and Engaged Research methods seek to ethically engage with communities, co-create research questions and design, and involve all parties as co-contributors in the research process. Community partners are considered equal partners with critical knowledge on how to address core social issues in our communities. CBR/PAR challenges traditional forms of knowledge production, aims to uplift voices in the community, and promote social change.

How to engage in Community-Based Research:

• Brainstorm possible CBR/PAR ideas with the OCEL
  • Learn more about our community partners whose missions align with your research and teaching goals
• Collaborate with community stakeholders
  • Listen and learn more together
• Connect with the OCEL to seek funding support