• Global Community-Engaged Learning Best Practices
  • Global Community-Engaged Learning Ethical Engagement - Preparing for Engagement

Preparing for Engagement: Orientation for students, faculty, host families and community partners
Diane Doberneck, Ph.D.

A critical component of preparing for engagement is language. Do all participants have contributions or do participants have responsibilities?

Diane Doberneck's, Ph.D. workshop, Preparing for engagement: Orientation for students, faculty, host families and community partners taught participants how to prepare all parties for a community-engaged learning experience. Doberneck used her program, Community Engagement in Rural Ireland in Tochar Valley, Ireland as an example.

All participants whether a community partner, student, faculty, or resource person has a contribution. The language of a community-engaged learning experience should reflect such.

The term 'responsibility' indicates a one-sided relationship where non-community members are the main contributors to the community. This promotes saviorism. 'Contributions' elevate the role of the community partner who contributes knowledge, resources and to the overall success. The term affirms their value, especially when it describes disadvantaged communities. "The community partner is the giver and the receiver," Doberneck said.

Identifying participants is also essential because it allows everyone to better understand the program and their role. For her syllabus, Doberneck creates a graphic of all participants that includes a description of their contribution.

The language of a community-engaged learning program also clarifies expectations. For Doberneck's Ireland program, applications were given to potential community partners and specified projects which allowed them to decide on their participation. Doberneck also sent welcome letters which included a syllabus for community partners, the host families and mentor teams, which she sometimes changed to best address the needs one contributes.

Communities prepared for engagement by:

• Deciding if they have a project for students and if it’s too big or too small
• Identifying resource people, those who have knowledge, skills, talent or job access to resources community partners and students wouldn’t
• Helping identify host families

Doberneck also encouraged community partners' preparation with the question "Who can tell them about stories about the history of the town?" Doberneck prepared her students in three pre-orientation sessions before departure and one orientation session in Ireland. Students practiced small talk, an important cultural component in Ireland, and uncommon practice in America. Much of the preparation is experience over time.

During the program, students were graded on journal reflection questions, weekly dialogue participation, a final essay and final project. Students were also assigned small history assignments that required them to interview community members. Answers were typically gained from taking a walk with someone from the village.

One of Doberneck's proudest engagement outcomes is the foundation for the continuance of relationships after the program concludes. "It gave our nonprofit partner more of an expanded network of people they could call on, she said." It also gave the villages themselves, a new contact person and new relationship. It helped build their capacity to find expertise if they needed it later on."