How does the CCE collaborate with and support faculty?

To enable community-engaged pursuits within the classroom and research agendas, the CCE works to expand the capacity of interested faculty by providing intellectual and practitioner support in each stage. In particular, we work to better understand and share how to adapt, extend, and leverage a condensed, immersive block format for community impact. CCE staff can support you in learning best practices and successful models for the block, act as thought partners in designing a class or research project, can connect you with partners and community-identified needs, serve as co-facilitators or connect you to community co-facilitators, and can work with your students or advisees interested in applied assignments or thesis projects. We also welcome collaboration through your contribution to co-curricular student learning alongside the classroom; feel free to let us know if you’d like to offer a student workshop!

Open to collaborating with the CCE, but not sure where to begin? Below, we've drafted a roadmap of possibilities for collaboration.


But first, a few things you may be wondering ...

The Collaborative for Community Engagement (CCE) advances the public purpose of liberal arts education through co-creating community-engaged learning experiences to develop students into engaged citizens who invest their education in the public good. To accomplish this mission, we get students engaged in community, help to prepare them to engage intentionally, work to integrate community work into classroom experiences, cultivate community partnerships, and bring community to campus as co-educators.

  • Community-Engaged Learning (CEL)Most fundamentally, a community-engaged learning (CEL) course promotes student learning and has community impact.  Practically, CEL courses include collaborations with community partners (non-profits, government agencies, social enterprises, members, leaders) around projects or experiences that aim to help students learn course content and benefit communities beyond the academy. The most well-known form, service-learning, integrates community service into the classroom experience, but there are several ways to teach for community impact!  Other models that work on the block include: capacity-building projects, community-engaged research, consulting for the public good, learning from and with community, place-based engagement, and co-creative expression and storytelling.
  • Community-Engaged Research (CER): Research that invests the pursuit of knowledge in the public good. Co-created by academics and communities impacted by the issue or practitioners, this research aims to produce actionable knowledge – that which leads to desired social change.
  • Community Engagement: Collaborative efforts to invest in the common good, contributing to the quality of life and shared democratic futures of communities within and beyond campus.

CCE Staff Member

Role

Email

Director

Jordan Travis Radke, PhD (Sociology, focus in social movements and inequality)

faculty development, course and research-based partnerships, educational workshops & courses for students

jradke@coloradocollege.edu

Community Partnership Coordinator

Niki Sosa Gallegos

support for and relationship-building with community-based organizations, connect partners to students/faculty

nsosa@coloradocollege.edu

Civic Leadership Program Coordinator

Tyra Voget

cohort-based student civic leadership programs that integrate community engagement and cocurricular learning

tvoget@coloradocollege.edu  

Student Engagement Coordinator

Sarah Elsey

cross-campus student “onramps” to community work, student-led organizations and initiatives

selsey@coloradocollege.edu

show all / hide all

Just getting started? Participate in the Publicly Engaged, Actionable Knowledge (PEAK) Project! This project seeks to bridge campus knowledge to community impact by connecting CC educators to nonprofit partners for community-engaged teaching projects. Here how it works: One semester in advance, you share courses into which you’d like to incorporate a community-engaged learning project.  The CCE shares that information with a wide range of partners, and seeks to match you to partners whose work aligns with the course. If you don’t get matched that round, we’ll try again the following semester!

You are also always welcome to reach out to our Community Partnerships Coordinator Niki Sosa Gallegos at nsosa@coloradocollege.edu for support in building relationships with local organizations, or check out our community organizations database.

Already designed a community-engaged learning course? Tag your course! Read more about the criteria online and email details to jradke@coloradocollege.edu. Doing so allows us to share your work with other faculty and students interested in community-engaged learning, and gather data on the ways in which our campus is creating community impact through courses.

Interested in what courses have been tagged this year? Log in to Banner and go to "Class Schedule."  Once you have selected a term, you may use the drop-down menu for the "type" of class to search for "community-engaged learning" courses.

Connect with CCE Director Jordan Travis Radke to brainstorm course design and projects or Niki Sosa Gallegos, Community Partnership Coordinator, to explore community partnership possibilities.

Join us for Faculty Development workshops such as Introduction to Community-Engaged Learning on the Block, Balancing Community Impact and Student Learning, or Power and Ethics. See upcoming events here.

Review our resources for community-engaged teaching and/or research, or grab a book from our office. We have created several great cheat-sheets and 1-pagers available on this webpage. 

Apply for a community-engaged learning curriculum or community-engaged research mini-grant.

Share more about what you’re already doing with the CCE, so we can share and celebrate your work. Email jradke@coloradocollege.edu

Ask that CCE staff co-facilitate a class session, workshop, or come share targeted information on relevant community work. CCE staff are happy to lead discussions or exercises around how to engage in community work intentionally and equitably. As another example, Jordan regularly offers workshops on community-engaged research principles and practices to research-oriented classes.  

Offer your expertise to engaged students in co-curricular spaces, as for example facilitating a student workshop as part of the CCE’s Changemaker Curriculum workshop series.

Offer your expertise to CCE staff through serving on the CCE Advisory Board. Our goal is to engage a diverse group of stakeholders in guiding and informing the work of the CCE. We facilitate infrequent but thoughtfully designed meetings that give stakeholders the opportunity to serve as a true "thought partner" with meaningful voice. To express interest, email jradke@coloradocollege.edu

The mission of the ºÚÁÏ³Ô¹Ï Liberal Arts in Correctional Facilities Initiative (LACF) is to address inequities in higher education by expanding access to higher education for incarcerated persons. 

Through the LACF, ºÚÁÏ³Ô¹Ï faculty offer for-credit courses at no cost in the Youthful Offenders System (YOS) facility in Pueblo, which serves a population of 19 to 25-year-olds. Student receive credit through Pueblo Community College (PCC), and courses are guaranteed to transfer as requirements toward associates or bachelor's degrees at any Colorado public institution of higher learning. The foundation of LACF is a 3-way partnership between ºÚÁϳԹÏ, the Colorado Department of Corrections, and Pueblo Community College (PCC).

Find out more, and express interest in participating, here.

 

show all / hide all

Still have questions? Email CCE Director, Dr. Jordan Travis Radke, at jradke@coloradocollege.edu.

Share, Explore, & Connect with the CCE

Share Your Experience

We want to hear about your experiences engaging with the community! Tells about your experience working with local organizations so that we can tell the story of community engagement and assess how to better support the campus and local community through partnerships. 
feedback button

Connect with Us

cce house
(719) 389-6846
1008 N. Weber
Colorado Springs, CO 80903

         

Quick Links

students button

 

faculty button

 

partner button

Report an issue - Last updated: