Service-Learning and Civic Engagement

What is Engaged Scholarship

The term redefines faculty scholarly work from application of academic expertise to community-engaged scholarship that involves the faculty member in a reciprocal partnership with the community, is interdisciplinary, and integrates faculty roles of teaching, research, and service. Engaged scholarship is defined by the collaboration between academics and individuals outside the academy - knowledge professionals and the lay public (local, regional/state, national, global) - for the mutually beneficial exchange of knowledge and resources in a context of partnership and reciprocity. The scholarship of engagement includes explicitly democratic dimensions of encouraging the participation of non-academics in ways that enhance and broaden engagement and deliberation about major social issues inside and outside the university.

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Best Practices for Conducting Engaged Scholarship

  • Start engaging with community partners early. Building relationships and successful projects and products take time.
  • Ensure ongoing documentation of engaged scholarship efforts to track changes or consistency over time.
  • Align engaged scholarship with discipline, department, campus, and national priorities to make the faculty member’s contribution clear.
  • Select dossier support mentors to learn the specific criteria, processes, and norms used for promotion and tenure reviews.
  • Publish and prevent engaged scholarship in a variety of significant academic and community venues early and often.
  • Select service roles carefully and translate them to scholarship opportunities whenever possible in order to demonstrate the value in everything you do.
  • Be aware of and manage what influences faculty scholarly work.

Source: N.K. Franz. (2011). Tips for constructing a promotion and tenure dossier that documents engaged scholarship endeavors. Journal of Higher Education Outreach and Engagement , 15(3).

Calls for Papers / Items of Interest

Public - A Journal of Imagining America is currently inviting submissions for Volume 5, Issue 1 on the topic of public data.

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Engaged Scholarship Toolkit