Service activities offered at the Civic Engagement Center appeal to all interests, academic programs and levels of commitment. There are opportunities available for every major and every student's class schedule. Use the dot system described below to pick an experience that meets your time, personal and professional interests. The dots represent the skill level and time required by an activity.
Volunteer
- Simple service experiences
- Easy, pre-established activities
- Often a low level of time commitment
- Few specialized skills required
Co-curricular
- Provides opportunities to explore potential academic/career interests
- Allows for informal participation resulting in personal and professional development
- Develops content knowledge, skills, and critical thinking
- Highlights the benefits associated with being involved outside of the classroom
Service-Learning
- Utilizes academic knowledge to support the needs of the community
- Aligns with classroom objectives in a unique service opportunity
- Service experiences are guided by a faculty member and encourage mentorship
- Initiates a relationship between students, their coursework and the community
- Directly ties course outcomes with an out-of-classroom service commitment
Service Internships
- Real-life, extended service experience that directly aligns with intended degree
- Provides a focused civic engagement opportunity with concrete outcomes established by the student, faculty member and community entity
- Individual learning agreement incorporates input directly from faculty, career services, and community partners
- Benefits of service are jointly shared between student and service site
- Places students in the workplace where they engage in professional experiences tied to their academic or career goals
- Students and faculty establish objectives or projects that illustrate how academic skills were used to serve the community partner
- May serve as a practicum experience for academic programs
Capstone Projects
- Encourages self-directed students to create, develop, and implement complex, multi-dimensional service projects
- Utilizes advanced leadership skills to effectively accomplish community engagement activities
- Serves as a tangible demonstration of a student's knowledge, skills, and abilities
- Employs independently established research and resources to create a final project that makes a significant contribution to the public good
- Builds proficiencies in students' abilities to communicate, network and organize
- Displays all of a student's academic and professional capabilities and how they were used to serve a specific need in the community
