Introduction
Socially engaged education has been a focus of Utrecht University for several years. Utrecht University (UU) finds it important that her graduates have the knowledge and the skills to make a substantial contribution to society. To prepare students for taking such role, UU has for several years promoted innovative education in which teachers and students join forces with a partner organization or community from outside the university to develop en project around a socially relevant theme. At UU, this is called Community Engaged Learning (CEL) but elsewhere it is also known as service learning, community based learning or civic learning.
Within UU, the term CEL was chosen, as this emphasises the importance of close cooperation with society, such as (semi)public organisations, citizens and other social partners. CEL may engage different communities outside of the university, such as underserved or underprivileged groups, NGO’s, or government agencies. Teachers, students and societal partner organizations interact on a basis of mutual exchange and equality. Together, they are working on - issues of shared concern, including the systemic aspects of those issues. In CEL, this process of discovery is at least as important as any product delivered. In the process, students will strengthen typical CEL competencies such as collaboration, connection of academic and professional points of view, and reflection as a way of learning. But most of all, they will have the transforming learning experience of actively working for and with others in society towards solutions for current challenges.
Developing and teaching a CEL course is challenging for teachers, because it is very different compared with regular education (Tijsma et al., 2020). CEL assumes a mutual and equal collaboration between teachers, students and external partner organizations. This requires different teachers competencies, such as establishing a relationship with community partners. Another major difference is that the process of project development is more important than the results or products that will be delivered. This has major implications for the way in which assessment will take place in a CEL course. Also, implementing reflection strategies is an important part of designing a CEL course.
To support teachers in taking their roles in the development and teaching CEL courses, the UU offers an elaborate training program. It consists of tailored, individual and short term support, next to two CEL courses. In the regular CEL course, teachers work on designing and developing their own CEL course. Together they explore the characteristics of CEL and what cooperation with social partners can look like. Topics such as assessment, reflection and ethical questions are also covered. Participants learn with and from each other by studying CEL together, exchanging experiences and developing into a network of teacher-experts in the field of CEL. In this way, the course aids the teachers in gaining CEL competences and contributes directly to the implementation of CEL courses in the UU educational programs. The advanced CEL course is intended for CEL teachers who have experience in developing and teaching CEL courses, and are a course coordinator of a CEL course. In the advanced course teachers explore together a CEL specific theme in depth by using an approach that capitalizes on the CEL competences. In this way, teachers become masters in CEL education and can support starting CEL teachers. In addition, in depth knowledge of CEL becomes available to the teaching community.
The workshop
In this workshop we aim for an inspiring exchange of ideas on teacher professionalization on CEL. What are the challenges for teachers? What are the challenges and opportunities in supporting teachers? The educational support program at the UU will serve as an example.The proposed workshop consists of three parts:
1) Introduction about CEL
First we introduce our participants to CEL, including literature and the Utrecht University approach. Sharing components and goals of CEL activities, we will discuss what CEL entails and how it can look like.
2) Challenges for teachers
Second, we focus on challenges for teachers involved in CEL. What competencies are needed? How is it different from other courses? We invite participants to share their own experiences.
3) The CEL educational support program at Utrecht University: sharing good practices
The last part of our workshop is about the educational support programme at Utrecht University. We aim to inspire participants as well as collect their input on our activities for teachers.
