Experiential learning and community engagement are two closely related facets of our core academic mission. They allow us to test knowledge against experience and to put knowledge to use for the benefit of society.
With a longstanding commitment to experiential learning, we aim to increase the opportunities for students to partake in local, national and international internships, service learning, research projects and other forms of applied learning.
We will also be widening the implementation of the International Degree Profile and bolstering our existing community partnerships, allowing students more opportunities to exercise ethics, responsible citizenship, critical engagement and global awareness in their courses, research and interdisciplinary activities.
Students
- Discipline-specific forms of professional preparation through workshops and online resources.
- Increased opportunities to engage in internships, research placements, and entrepreneurship initiatives.
- Further implementation of the International Degree Profile.
- Ability to fuse academics and social responsibility through the development of community-engaged scholarship.
- Increased opportunities to exercise ethics, citizenship, critical engagement and global awareness in academic settings.
Faculty
- Opportunities for focused departmental discussions on how teaching and learning can be infused with social responsibility and global awareness.
- Increasing coordination and collaboration in support of internships, community placements, and student career development.
Community
- An increase in students’ direct involvement with community initiatives.
- More community-focused research and creative activity.
Objective 4 priority actions
- 4.1 Increase opportunities for students to gain extramural experience that complements formal classroom learning and fosters professional development.
- 4.1.1 Provide workshops and increased online resources in support of discipline-specific forms of professional preparation, where appropriate.
- 4.1.2 Increase opportunities for students to engage in local, national, and international internships, service learning, research projects, and other forms of applied learning.
- 4.1.3 Increase collaboration and coordination among Concordia’s several entities already active in this area, including the Institute for Co-Operative Education, the JMSB Centre for Career Development, the Institute for Community Development, Career and Placement Services and placement officers in individual academic programs.
- 4.2 Expand opportunities for students to exercise ethics, citizenship, critical engagement, and global awareness in their courses, research, and co-curricular activities.
- 4.2.1 Develop a proposal for a program to promote and reward academic programs, which encourages community-engaged approaches to building academic skills and knowledge.
- 4.2.2 As part of regular curriculum appraisal processes, encourage and facilitate focused departmental discussions on how ethics, citizenship, critical engagement, and global awareness are and should be integrated into program coursework and related co-curricular activities.
- 4.2.3 Widen the implementation of the International Degree Profile and/or similar initiatives.
- 4.2.4 Encourage students to take advantage of volunteer opportunities, in particular those that mesh with academic program objectives, whether by supporting their inclusion on a co-curricular transcript or diploma supplement, or, where appropriate and properly vetted, through more formal mechanisms such as problem-based service learning for academic credit.
- 4.3 Explore ways to bolster existing university-community partnerships.
- 4.3.1 Develop an inventory of current university/community partnerships and the resources and policies that facilitate them, in comparison to models of good practice elsewhere.
- 4.3.2 Test the effectiveness of setting aside a small pool of research seed grants to fund community-engaged scholarship.
