CSL News: FALL 2017

WELCOME

Welcome all to another term of CSL! As I write this I am sitting in our partnership coordinators office and gazing up at their whiteboard tracking system of CSL activities. It’s marvellous to see the depth and breadth of the work of our students, instructors and community partners. Currently we are learning from and co-generating knowledge with organizations such as Kindred House and Elizabeth Fry (CSL 100), Braided Journeys culturally-based Indigenous programming for school students (EDU 235; 613; FOMD), Adaptabilities and Edmonton Immigrant Services Association (PSYCO 325); the Canada-China Friendship Society (ENGL 102) and Arts Start (WGS 101). We even have students continuing the work of our own CBR project in working with our community partners to develop their specific research questions for collaboration with UAlberta researchers (EDSE 613). And these barely skim the surface of the deep engagement going on this term!

I also wanted to alert you to two events we are coordinating this term: a CSL Instructor workshop on designing your syllabus for CSL (October 18th) and then our CSL-KIAS-Skills Connect Café, where our community partners can meet researchers on campus to begin the partnering required for community-engaged research (November 8th). It would be great to see you at one of these.

Best of luck this term!

David Peacock, CSL Executive Director

PEOPLE

A few new staff changes at CSL: Kathleen Kruper, who was filling a maternity leave as one of our Partnership Coordinators, has moved on to the Faculty of Engineering. We wish the best of luck in her new role. And returning to CSL is Angie Meyer and Erin Carter - welcome back!

Erin Carter, Community Outreach Intern I am very excited to be working as an intern for Humanities 101 this year! I was fortunate enough to work for CSL in the past and got to know the Humanities program during that time. This week was the first Hum 101 class and it felt like it flew by in a matter of minutes. I look forward to getting to know the learners and also observe how pedagogy is put into practice. Since I am in my third year of an education degree HUM101 will be an excellent learning experience for me.

Cassidy Cook, CSL Student Intern I am a third year Education student currently studying Social Studies and ESL. I came across CSL through a first year Education course and have loved it ever since! I’ve always been very interested in learning and teaching about social justice, and CSL is an excellent way to do that. I see CSL as a great education method- it allows students to gain real life experience in the non-profit sector, and puts theories learned in the classroom to practice. I love meeting new people through CSL and am grateful for this opportunity.

DATES

OCT 13: CSL Student Intern Application Due OCT 16: Winter 2018 CSL Intentions Due OCT 16: Small Grant Application Due NOV 20: Pathways Application Due

EVENTS

OCT 18: Instructor Workshop OCT 25: Nicaragua GSL Course Info Session NOV 1: Student Group Info Session NOV 8: Connect Café

HUMANITIES 101

Over the summer HUM 101 participated in the Indigenous Canada MOOC. Typically a MOOC is designed for folks to go through the course material individually in their own spaces, requiring access to Internet, a quiet space, and a certain literacy level, things that are often taken for granted. Instead, Hum 101 folks met each week on campus to go through the course together, learning alongside and from one another. We capped off this valuable learning experience with a graduation ceremony that took place in the Old Arts Building. HUM learners were presented with a Blended Learning Certificate from the Faculty of Native Studies.

The Humanities 101 and Wings program are now kicking off the fall semester with two exciting new themes: in HUM 101 we are exploring Changing Cities and in Wings we will be learning about Radical Women.

EVALUATION NEWS

As we begin this new academic year, we would like to wish our students, instructors, and community partners a successful academic year. This year the CSL evaluation team has decided to give our veteran instructors and community partners a break from completing evaluation surveys at the end of the term. However, we will ask all new instructors and community partners to participate in our evaluation process. As Education courses (EDU 100 and EDU 300) are fairly new to the program, we will continue to evaluate these courses as well. In the meantime, the evaluation team will focus on analyzing aggregate data from the past couple of years aiming at a more in-depth evaluation of the program and its progress.

PARTNERSHIP SPOTLIGHT

Young Agrarians (YA) is a network for new and young ecological and organic farmers. Since we started in January 2012, the network has grown across Canada from coast to coast through farmers organizing events (mixers, farm tours & potlucks, apprentice meet-ups, etc.), contributing resources, and more. We are in our second year of partnership with the UAlberta CSL program, and have had students from ALES 204 develop communications materials for us, and students from AREC 173 and SOC 291 document stories of our members to share with the broader community. We look forward to working with AREC 173 students again this term.

NEW ARTS VIDEO

Check out this new video from the Faculty of Arts, profiling Taylor-Rae Foster, a former CSL student, and current CSL mentor.