Advancing Student Success by Integrating Civic Learning and Community Engagement into Guided Pathways

Community Colleges are ideal hubs of civic engagement. They are at the nexus of public and private pressures to adapt and deliver key educational experiences that advance the economic, social, political, and civic health of our local communities. “The road to greater justice and equity runs through community colleges.”

In a recent book, Redesigning America’s Community Colleges: A Clearer Path to Student Success (2015), the authors argue that what is needed is a comprehensive reform model that transforms the entire college to focus on student success. They proposed a guided pathways model that involves redesigning each part of the student experience, from the stage where students choose programs and start remedial or college-level work to the time of graduation when they move on to further education or careers. As of 2017, guided pathways reforms are being designed by more than 250 colleges. However, civic learning and community engagement can advance these efforts while fulfilling the commitment to the public purposes of higher education.

This virtual workshop will introduce best practices and model programs in community colleges that are effectively advancing institutional learning priorities and student success through the integration of civic learning and community engagement. The workshop will provide historical context, methodologies and models, and resources for civic and community engagement that takes into account the unique challenges and opportunities of community colleges and their critical role in preparing students to be informed, active, and mobilized leaders in their communities, states, and the world.

Though designed for community colleges, this series will also be beneficial for institutions engaging transfer, commuter, and non-traditional students.

Verdis Robinson serves as Director for Community College Engagement at Campus Compact, where directs The Democracy Commitment (TDC) initiative as part of his portfolio and continues the work he began two years ago as the national director of TDC, expanding membership, resources, and programming opportunities for community colleges. Before becoming national director of TDC, Robinson was a tenured Assistant Professor of History and African-American Studies at Monroe Community College (MCC) in Rochester, NY, where he taught web-enhanced, writing-intensive, service learning history courses for ten years. Additionally, Robinson is a fellow of the Aspen Institute’s Faculty Seminar on Citizenship and the American and Global Polity, and the National Endowment for the Humanities’ Faculty Seminar on Rethinking Black Freedom Studies: The Jim Crow North and West. He is also a Public Scholar of Humanities New York. Robinson also serves on the advisory boards for the ALL IN Campus Democracy Challenge, Bringing Theory to Practice, Students Learn Students Vote coalition, and the Reacting Consortium Board of Reacting to the Past (RTTP). He holds a B.M. in Voice Performance from Boston University, a B.S. cum laude and M.A. in History from SUNY College at Brockport, and an M.A. in African-American Studies from SUNY University at Buffalo.

Civic Guided Pathways: Advancing Student Success by Integrating Civic Learning and Community Engagement into Guided Pathways