A participatory process of developing and strengthening best practice principles in global service-learning is underway. At the 12th Annual International Association for Research on Service-Learning and Community Engagement Conference in Baltimore, MD, scores of global service-learning practitioners and community partners came together for initial conversation about best practice principles in the field.

We are pleased to announce that several of the recommendations developed at that gathering will be advanced throughout the coming year. Discussion will take place on this website, at the 6th Annual Cornell University Global Service-Learning Institute, and (pending) at the Forum on Education Abroad’s Standards of Good Practice Institute. The goal is to harness the insights of this increasingly broad community of development professionals, community-based organization representatives, study abroad and civic engagement professionals, academics, and researchers, to clearly articulate a set of best practice standards relating to community partnerships, transparency, and pedagogy.

Below are notes responding to the questions considered in Baltimore, including:

1. How do we guide the development of Global Civic Engagement in a more strategic way?
2. What tools and resources do we need to do the work well? To help others do the work well?
3. What structures/forums currently exist through which we can advance the dialogue toward articulation of exemplary practices?
4. What structures/forums are needed?
5. Next Steps?

Please consider the suggestions offered below, as well as the positive and negative community impacts mentioned in the previous post, then offer your own insights or concerns in the comments section. Additional opportunities to offer commentary and concerns will continue throughout the coming year as we consider best practices in community partnership, transparency, and pedagogy.

Many thanks to individuals and organizations who were central to developing the initial conversation at IARSLCE, including Maryland Campus Compact, New York Campus Compact, and Cornell University’s Center for Community Engaged Learning and Research. Notes from the conference appear below:

The Future of Global Community Engagement

Sept. 24, 2012 Baltimore, MD

Dinner Conversation

2) Purpose of gathering: to begin a conversation about how the emerging field of global community engagement might be guided productively/effectively

a) Review evolution of service-learning; strengths, weaknesses; 20 years after NSSE introduced the concept, still no commonly accepted definition; work on campuses remains widely divergent

• Strength= exponential application, real world, global citizenship
• Weakness= make central the issue of lack of community participation, student-obsessed, paternalistic
• Define GSL as a way of being? As a development model?
• Lack of concept (generally agreed upon) of RIGOR
• Can we help support Promotion +Tenure cases, peer review etc.

b) How do we guide the development of Global Civic Engagement in a more strategic way?

• Establish best practices
• Raise community partners’ voice, develop fair trade learning certification
• Critical engagement, challenging assumptions
• Context, value community knowledge and expertise
• As learning methodology?
• Standards/ best practices
• Ethics principles
• Outcome based/mission driven (may vary from school to school)
• Try to space out GSL sessions so that they do not occur all during the same sessions at IARSLCE (e.g.)
• Is it an umbrella term?
• Review and strengthen what worked
• Monitor change
• Learn from practice

c) What tools and resources do we need to do the work well? To help others do the work well?

• Relationships- funds for faculty development
• Awareness of perspectives, diversity of knowledge
• The $100 solution (philosophy principles)
• Guidelines posted, web discussions
• Publications (including non-academic journals)
• Dissemination of knowledge/ideas
• Focused issue of IARSLCE journal/MJCSL
• Cluster For a (outline/conference call)
• $ for journals, faculty, incentive grants, conference
• Lobby federal government to support major effort to create additional “center for GCE”
• Invest in young people. They are the future
• Engage local and global partners and document lessons learned

d) What structures/forums currently exist through which we can advance the dialogue toward articulation of exemplary practices?

• Campus Compact
• Forum on Education Abroad
• IARSLCE
• IPSL
• IIP
• The International volunteers programs association
• NAFSA
• Regional Studies
• Amizade
• Irish BP volunteer philanthropy
• IARSLCE
• He-sl
• What about creation of GLE/GCE/ISL/GSL?
• Sub guilds around themes of student/faculty preparation and ethics
• Awareness cultural complexity/cultural context
• AERA – subject specific national conference eg. AAA (anthro)
• IARSLCE conference, website, regional and global exchanges

e) What structures/forums are needed?

• GCE specific
• International
• A way for responsible , quality engagement with international communities and partners
• Research vs. data collection (ethics focus)
• Rethink dissertation model: 3 articles (portfolio dissertation)
• Structures to share theory and logistics
• Forum on Education Abroad (bigger presence)
• Presence @ GULF South Summit etc.
• Address the issue of white women dominating the field (research)
• Online exchange can make up the challenges created by distance

f) Next Steps?

• Continue dialogue
• Keep conversation going on how to build a better world
• Break down barriers that prevent students from accessing programs (GCE)-how is this related to the higher education access conversation?
• How do we better prepare students/families for the abroad experience?
• I tend to think of this as ISL/GSL/GCE as Globally Engaged Scholarship- I am open to an open discourse/dialogue (online/in person) or a webinar or something like this to hash this out
• Community Partnerships-that’s the way of the future