Center for Regional Engagement
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DEFINITIONS...

Regional Engagement (Stewardship):  "Regional stewardship or public engagement is characterized by a partnership between the institution or some part of it and an external constituency. The partnership involves mutual definition of a regional need/opportunity, planning to address the need/opportunity, and accountability. It typically involves resources from all partners and is tied to outcomes and metrics for measuring those outcomes. Activities cut across the triad of teaching, research, and service." (The Council for Postsecondary Education web site at http://www.cpe.ky.gov/NR/rdonlyres/D38137B6-92FE-44F4-9A5F-F519E3447BFF/0/RegionalStewardshipProgramTerminology.pdf, retrieved on Saturday, August 30, 2008).

Community Service:  "Services which are identified by an institution of higher education, through formal or informal consultation with local nonprofit, governmental, and community-based organizations, as designed to improve the quality of life for community residents, particularly low-income individuals, or to solve particular problems related to their needs (the Higher Education Act of 1965, as amended by the Higher Education Amendments of 1992, and the Higher Education Technical Amendments of 1993 website at http://web.missouri.edu/~wrkstudy/comserv2.html, retrieved on Wednesday, September 03, 2008).

Service-Learning:  Service-learning is a form of intentional, experiential learning.  These educational experiences fulfill learning goals of academic courses while strengthening community assets and addressing community needs.  The students reflect on their service activities to gain a deeper understanding of course content, a broader appreciation of the discipline, improved critical thinking skills and an enhanced sense of values and civic responsibility.  The college and community partners engage in ongoing assessment to foster a stewardship of place (MSU Service-Learning Task Force Committee Report, May 1, 2006).

Service-Learning Criteria:

  • Linking the service component directly to the academic learning objectives of the course.
  • Defining the service performed by students as meeting a community need, as defined by or developed collaboratively with the community entity.
  • Making an integral part of the course curriculum structured opportunities for students to critically reflect on the community service and synthesize these experiences with academic theories and concepts.
  • Evaluating the overall course performance of students based on their success at integrating the academic concepts of the course and the community service experience.

Reflection:  The critical component of successful service-learning is reflection.  Reflection describes the process of deriving meaning and knowledge from experience and occurs before, during, and after a service-learning project.  Effective reflection engages both teachers and students in a thoughtful and thought-provoking process that consciously connects learning with experience.  It is the use of critical thinking skills to prepare for and learn from service experiences (National Service-Learning Clearinghouse @ http://www.servicelearning.org/hehome/).    

Capstone: 

A course where students demonstrate mastery of general education core skills, mastery of content specific to the major, and ability to integrate, synthesize and use what they have learned.

Cooperative Experience: 

Co-operative Education and Internships are professional level experiential education for students to apply classroom theory to real life work situations. Students may do experiential education either as an academic internship in which they earn college credit for working with an employer or as a non-credit internship. Students may not always need academic credit, but would like to earn valuable work experience by utilizing a non-credit internship. Generally, a non-credit internship should be paid, according to Department of Labor standards.

Field Experience: 

During the junior or senior year, one semester is spent participating in an internship with an agency, organization, business, or legislative office, instead of in the classroom. The College believes that it is important that our students spend at least three months interning in an organization and a position that allows them to apply what they have learned in the classroom to the professional world (James Madison University retrieved on 04.24.2009 at http://jmc.msu.edu/cs/fe.asp).

Experiences are designed to provide teacher candidates with opportunities to view the entire scope of teaching in a classroom setting and to develop skills and self-confidence necessary to be effective teachers These carefully planned field experiences are woven into every aspect of the teacher education program curriculum (Morehead State University CoE, retrieved on 04.24.2009 at http://www.moreheadstate.edu/esu/index.aspx?id=3009). 

Internship: 

Co-operative Education and Internships are professional level experiential education for students to apply classroom theory to real life work situations. Students may do experiential education either as an academic internship in which they earn college credit for working with an employer or as a non-credit internship. Students may not always need academic credit, but would like to earn valuable work experience by utilizing a non-credit internship. Generally, a non-credit internship should be paid, according to Department of Labor standards.

Practicum:  A practicum is a college course; often in a specialized field of study that is designed to give students supervised practical application of a previously studied theory. Practicum’s (student-teaching) are common for education and social work majors.