Resources
Serve in Place: Community-engaged learning during COVID-19
Is there an aspect of daily life that COVID-19 hasn’t changed? We’ve had to rethink how we stay healthy; how we work; how we shop for food; how we connect with family and friends — among many other things.
Also, the pandemic has forced us to adopt new ways of teaching, learning and conducting research; building relationships; and developing collaborative partnerships. But we’re up to the task because we know that community-engaged learning has a powerful effect on student learning, has a positive impact on communities, and can support students and faculty as they Serve in Place and work with community partners in this time of global upheaval.
These days, we’re more compelled than ever to support our neighbors, community partners and fellow humans — in our home communities and around the world. We are compelled to Serve in Place.
Does it look exactly like the community-engaged learning we’re used to? Probably not.
Will it still center community-based values, provide students with opportunities to be meaningfully engaged beyond their coursework and support faculty who want to pivot their courses and research in response to the crisis? Yes, yes and yes!
The Einhorn Center is committed to helping every Cornellian to Serve in Place. We’ve moved many existing programs to online formats, we’ve created new workshops and webinars to dive deeper into Serve in Place and how to do it well, and we’re adjusting funding opportunities to support these new projects.
Student Opportunities
- Apply for winter Serve in Place Funding. Applications open in October.
- If you’re already involved in our individual and group community-engaged leadership programs, stay involved!
- Check out Serve in Place projects on the Community Engagement Showcase.
Faculty and Staff Opportunities
- Watch the recording of the Beyond Technology: Community-Engaged Learning during Crisis webinar
- Adapt a current grant-funded project or apply for a new one
- Faculty and staff who need funding to get a student Serve in Place project going should apply for an Engaged Opportunity Grant by October 29.
- Current grantees can change their existing projects and funding to address challenges that have emerged out of the pandemic. If you’d like to move to a different kind of engagement, or talk through possible ways to keep helping your partners, reach out to Anna Bartel or Amanda Wittman.
- Faculty and staff who need funding to get a student Serve in Place project going should apply for an Engaged Opportunity Grant by October 29.
- Use the Cornell Community Engagement Educators Listserv to talk to Cornell faculty and staff colleagues about issues related to challenges to teaching, learning and partnerships in the face of COVID-19. (To subscribe, email engaged-faculty-l-request@cornell.edu with the subject line “join”.)
- If you know alumni who are participating in relief, rebuilding and recovery activities that students could join, encourage them to add their profile to CUeLINKS and check the “positive social impact” checkbox.
Resources and collaborations from the Einhorn Center
- Social Distancing Is No Reason to Stop Service Learning – Just Do It Online (The Conversation), by Marianne Krasny, professor of natural resources, talking about an e-engagement research project conducted by Yue Li, research associate; Deana Gonzales, undergraduate; and Anna Sims Bartel, associate director, community-engaged curricula and practice, Einhorn Center, May 2020
- Frequently Asked Questions about Einhorn Center grants and programs, March 2020
- Supporting Partnerships in Changing Times, by Anna Sims Bartel, March 2020
- Critical Reflection during COVID-19, April 2020
Non-Cornell Resources We Like
- Coronavirus and the Engaged Campus, Minnesota Campus Compact, March 2020
- COVID-19: Local-Global Learning and Civic Resources, globalsl.org, March 2020