National and regional groups of universities that promote community engagement have been increasing around the world – some of them at breakneck speed. Yet while facing an uphill task to set up valuable collaborations with local community groups, university engagement organisations are also connecting globally to learn from one another.

International links help them see how to overcome their own problems, say the leaders of national and regional groups.

While focused on their own citizens and areas, the growth in regional and national groups means the global network of community-engaged universities is also growing, including the network of networks, known as the Talloires Network which is holding its 2014 Talloires Network Leaders Conference in South Africa from 2-4 December.

“There is a similar development trajectory for regional and national networks,” notes Amy Newcomb Rowe, programme manager at the Talloires Network based at Tufts University in the US.

In the early years, the overwhelming task was to set up university collaborations with community groups to place students. The next stage is extending the collaboration so that it works two ways – universities learning from communities and engagement becoming an integral part of the university curriculum, according to research at Tufts.

“Internationally they focus initially on exchange of experience and later joint programmes,” Newcomb Rowe says.

Disengaged youth
One of the longest established national university community engagement organisations is the US Campus Compact. With more than 1,100 member institutions since it was founded in the 1980s, this shows how the notion of engagement has evolved over the decades.

Campus Compact grew out of a general perception that young people were disengaged from public questions. “Since the 1990s there was a movement towards connecting this work more directly with the curriculum,” says Andrew Seligsohn, president of Campus Compact.

Practical experience in the community “can advance student learning both about the disciplinary questions they would be studying in courses and also about how to be effective in communities,” he says.  Read the rest here.