CCE Announces Recipients of 2021-22 Service-Learning Award

Fri, 09/17/2021 - 09:07am | By: Christy Arrazattee

The Center for Community Engagement (CCE) at The University of Southern Mississippi (USM) has announced the 2021-22 recipients of the Conville Service-Learning Development Award, a $2,000 grant for graduates of USM’s Faculty Fellows Seminar on Service-Learning to pursue service-learning initiatives.

The 2021-22 Conville Service-Learning Development Award will fund the research team of Dr. Ann Marie Kinnell, director of Interdisciplinary Studies and Professional Development, and Dr. Christopher Foley, assistant professor of English in the School of Coastal Resilience. Kinnell and Foley will research the prevalence and institutionalization of service-learning and community-engaged teaching at USM.

Kinnell and Foley will conduct interviews with faculty, staff, community partners, and administrators to study how service-learning has evolved at USM over the nearly 20 years since the first service-learning class was introduced. Interviews will examine perceived supports and barriers for community-engaged faculty, in addition to the perspectives of administrators, community partners, and students regarding their perspectives and experiences with service-learning.

“Service-learning is a wonderful pedagogy because it brings faculty, students, and community partners together to create projects that benefit both the university and the community,” said Dr. Kinnell. “I am looking forward to finding out more about the service-learning projects we have been doing at USM and how service-learning impacts the relationships between the university and the community.”

The information gathered from the interviews will produce a publishable case study and will also provide insight into the need for new resources, supports, and initiatives.

“I view the campus-community co-benefits of academic service-learning coursework as integral and foundational to the long-term goal of improving coastal resilience in the Gulf South region,” said Dr. Foley. “I look forward to gaining a historically-informed perspective on past and current efforts to institutionalize service-learning at USM.”

The Richard L. Conville and Mozella P. Conville Center for Community Engagement Fund for Excellence provides one $2,000 grant each year to past graduates of USM’s Faculty Fellow Seminar on Service-Learning for the purpose of developing or redesigning a service-learning class, conducting or developing community-engaged or service-learning research, collaborating on an inter-collegiate service-learning initiative, advancing and promoting service-learning at USM and integrating service-learning into a college or department degree plan.

The Center for Community Engagement promotes service and service-learning on The University of Southern Mississippi campus and throughout the Hattiesburg community. To learn more about the CCE at Southern Miss, call 601.266.6467 or visit https://www.usm.edu/center-community-engagement.