Description

Community engagement involves bringing learners together with their community. It can include bringing community members into the classroom or bringing learners out into the community on field trips. Community engagement is one of many instructional strategies that instructors employ to correlate what is being taught and what is going on in a student’s community, including various institutions, literature, history, cultural history, and so on.

Advantages                                       

• By engaging with the community, learners come to see themselves as members of their community.
• Community activities can help learners get to know essential members of their community, give them a sense of belonging and help them seek support networks.
• Bringing role models into the classroom can motivate learners to strive to reach their academic potential.
• Community interaction allows learners to learn from more than one instructor and  get a variety of perspectives.

Disadvantages

• Safety concerns often require instructors and community members to complete forms and background checks before community engagement can occur.
• Locating members of the community willing to work with instructors can be difficult.

Implementation

1. The instructor does networking to find community members willing to come into the classroom.
2. The instructor finds relevant curriculum links that community members can help them teach about.
3. Instructors and community members meet to discuss a learning activity idea.
4. Community members and instructors team-teach in the classroom.
5. Learners are given the opportunity for one-on-one time with community members.
6. Learners present the results of their lesson to community members as part of the learning experience.
7. Instructors collect feedback from learners and community members and utilize this information to fine-tune their implementation.