Part I
Leaders Discuss Innovations in Outreach
Volume 4, Number 2
Fall, 1999
ESSAYS
Constructive and Complex Tensions
in the Art of Engagement
Lou Anna Simon
Michigan State University
The twenty-first century will be marked by constructive and complex tensions as universities continue on their journey of deepening engagement with society. If society were reinventing the research-intensive, land-grant university-of-the-coming century, this essay explores what such an institution would be. The new intellectual model for the effectively engaged-institution is one in which faculty and outreach partners aspire to a continuous braiding together of research and outreach. Issues and challenges associated with this new model are framed drawing from experience and innovation at Michigan State University.
A Model for Outreach to Groups
Underrepresented
in Science and Mathematics
Robert Megginson
The University of Michigan at Ann Arbor
This essay discusses outreach to minority communities underrepresented in the mathematical sciences through mathematics projects for precollege students that are designed to keep the students in the educational pipeline leading to mathematics-based college majors. The importance of such projects is discussed, along with the benefits to all parties involved in them. Some recommendations are given for those wishing to start such projects.
Witness: A Professor Shares His Experiences Working with Prisoners
Joseph Bathanti
Mitchell Community College
Linking Aging, Death, Global
Health,
and University-based Community Service Learning
David Leviton
Center on Aging, University of Maryland
This
article describes The Adult Health and Development Program at the University
of Maryland (AHDP/UMCP), and The Horrendous Death, Global Health and Well-being
Concept (HDC). The latter is part of the conceptual framework for the
former. The AHDP/UMCP educates students to apply gerontological health
theory and data. It is a service learning, intergenerational health program
where students and volunteers are trained to work on a one-to-one basis
with older institutionalized and non-institutionalized adults. Over 40
faculty from other colleges and universities in the U.S., and Beijing
have been trained to direct their own programs (called the National Network
for Intergenerational Health - NNIH). The HDC is a process designed to
prevent and eliminate people-caused deaths, especially those where the
motivation exists to kill others. The integration of the AHDP/NNIH and
ADC as a paradigm for higher education, public service, and public policy
is the focus of the paper.
Carry It On: Connecting Our Lives in Service
Patricia E. O’Connor Georgetown University
This article describes the personal experiences of Georgetown University English Professor Patricia E. O’Connor in her 15 years of educational outreach, service, and research among maximum and medium security prisoners and drug addicts. She details as well influences on her work from the national associations such as Campus Compact and the Invisible College in her efforts to form appropriate and fruitful relationships with Washington DC’s area institutions for rehabilitation.
The
Role of Universities in the Construction of Public Reason
Leonard M. Fleck, Michigan State
University
One of the most important roles universities
play in society is that of modeling, motivating, and sustaining respectful,
rational, democratic deliberation regarding controversial, complex,
deeply divisive moral and political issues. In a culturally diverse,
pluralistic society a special medium is needed wherein such deliberations
can occur regarding such problems as physician- assisted suicide, health
care rationing, the genetic engineering of future generations, and the
limits of scientific research. That special medium is what John Rawls
refers to as "public reason" and what John Dewey would refer to as "social
intelligence." Public reason is not something that is "given." Rather,
it needs to be carefully constructed. Universities, ideally, ought to
provide prime space for that constructive effort. I describe in this
essay several projects I designed and implemented in community settings
that exemplify what the construction of public reason is about in practice.
