"Service-learning" is a multilayered term with a complex historical evolution. In the last two decades, service-learning and community engagement (SLCE) have flourished in higher education as staff, faculty, and students have realized it can be a high-impact teaching and learning practice to promote student learning and development.…

Given their positions in communities across the United States, Extension educators are poised to have meaningful partnerships with the communities they serve. This article presents a case for the use of participatory research, which is a departure from more conventional forms of research based on objectivity, researcher distance, and social…

This paper describes an eight-year service-learning experiment that created four distinct spaces in which campus and community members meet, reflect, and act together. This work explores the tensions between traditional and critical service-learning, and points to the importance of building relationships with members of local communities and…

The most pressing social problems facing humanity in the 21st century are what systems theorist Russell Ackoff referred to as "messes"--complex dynamic systems of problems that interact and reinforce each other over time. In this article, the authors argue that the lack of progress in managing messes is in part due to the predominance of…

The concept of reciprocity permeates the literature on campus-community partnership as a matter of principle, aspiration, and--ideally--best practice. More recently, principles and practices of sustainability have pervaded scholarly and popular discourse, emerging from and applying to environmental studies, economic development, and social justice…

The regional universities in Russia are an important resource for the development of Russian society, but more needs to be done to increase their effectiveness, including tackling corruption and leveraging local competitive advantages.

The ideal of community engagement suggests that both a student's career and his college's mission are (or ought to be) inextricable from the community in which they are embedded. That students, faculty, and academic institutions should serve community purposes, actively engage in community affairs, and network themselves in real and virtual…

Program evaluation is recognized as an essential skill set for practitioners in service-related fields, such as education, nonprofit management, social work, and public health. Recently, the need for a public workforce trained in evaluation has increased and is driven primarily by our nation's emphasis on accountability during a time when…

Urban life comes with diverse social, environmental, health care, and education problems. However, for many of the people seeking better economic, social, and education opportunities, the big city still holds a special allure. Jazz singer Frank Sinatra sings in "New York, New York" that he wants to "wake up in a city that never…

This case study discusses a seldom explored outcome of public scholarship in higher education: economic impact. The case study connects student field experiences and faculty scholarship to the sustainability of academic departments, providing administrative leaders with the information and tools necessary to both survive and thrive during times of…

If people really want to make a difference in the lives of those living with war or poverty, globally, the single most important thing that they can do is to support education. This support is not limited to initiatives that promote education at the primary and secondary levels in developing countries, but is also directed at Canadian students of…

Attempts to correct misconceptions about the philosophy of community education, reviews its historical base, and discusses five principles basic to an understanding of and a commitment to the community education philosophy. (Author/RK)

"Higher Education Exchange" publishes case studies, analyses, news, and ideas about efforts within higher education to develop more democratic societies. Contributors to this issue of the "Higher Education Exchange" examine whether institutions of higher learning are doing anything to increase the capacity of citizens to shape…

This paper reviews service learning definitions and principles to illustrate common threads connecting service learning philosophy across contexts. Although there is general agreement that service learning occurs in school-based and community-based categories, it cannot be universally defined. Definitions from K-12, higher education, and adult…

The New Hampton School (New Hampshire) uses the holistic Total Human Development Model with both students and faculty to instill principles focused on relationships as central to teaching and learning; respect and responsibility; sense of community; whole person development within the community; compassion and service; and the meaningful,…