Eighth International Conference on Service-learning and Community Engagement




Robert G. Bringle
Robert G. Bringle, Ph.D. (Social Psychology, University of Massachusetts, 1974) Chancellor’s Professor of Psychology and Philanthropic Studies; Director, IUPUI Center for Service and Learning, Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis. Dr. Bringle has been involved in the development, implementation, and evaluation of educational programs directed at talented undergraduate psychology majors, high school psychology teachers, first-year students, and the introductory psychology course. As a social psychologist, he is widely known for his research on jealousy and close relationships. His work as Director of the IUPUI Center for Service and Learning has resulted in numerous national recognitions for his campus and himself. For his scholarly journal articles, chapters, and books on service learning, Dr. Bringle was awarded the Ehrlich Faculty Award for Service Learning and he was recognized at the International Service-Learning Research Conference for his outstanding contributions. He was the Volunteer of the Year in 2001 for Boys and Girls Clubs of Indianapolis. The University of the Free State, South Africa, awarded him an honorary doctorate for his scholarly work on civic engagement and service learning.
Jeffrey Howard
Jeffrey Howard is the Associate Director for Service-Learning at the University of Michigan’s Edward Ginsberg Center for Community Service and Learning. He has taught, conducted research, and published work on academic service-learning for 30 years. He is the founder and editor of the Michigan Journal of Community Service Learning and author of the Service-Learning Course Design Workbook, funded by the Corporation for National and Community Service, a publication widely used to develop faculty capacity to teach service-learning courses, which he uses when conducting workshops on service-learning at the University of Michigan and at colleges and universities around the country. He is a founding member of HENCE (Higher Education Network for Community Engagement) and a member of Michigan Campus Compact’s Board of Directors. Most recently he was part of the writing/editing team for “New Times Demand New Scholarship,” a publication deriving from the Research Universities and Community Engagement network that seeks to advance research universities’ role in higher education civic engagement.
Nick Cutforth
Nick Cutforth has been conducting research with urban schools and community-based organizations for over 15 years. His research and teaching interests include university/community partnerships, community-based research, urban education, and physical activity and youth development. Using fieldwork and applied research methods, his writing focuses on the social consequences of this work, and draws on the belief that the diverse talents of academics, students, educators, and community members can produce excellent research that will strengthen the community as a whole and enhance the relevance of the academy in addressing real world problems. He is a Senior Teacher-Scholar and member of the Campus Compact Service-Learning Consulting Corps. He has written over 20 articles and co-authored two books: Youth Development and Physical Activity: Linking Universities with Communities (Human Kinetics, 2000) and Community-Based Research and Higher Education: Principles and Practices (Joss ey-Bass, 2003). Nick coordinates the Colorado Community-Based Research Network (www.ccbrn.org) and has supervised over two-dozen community-based research projects with students and faculty colleagues and community partners since 1999.
Trisha Thorme
Trisha Thorme is the Assistant Director of the Community-Based Learning Initiative at Princeton University, a position she has held since 2000. She facilitates the collaboration of students, faculty, and community partners on community-driven research projects and works with faculty to integrate such projects into courses throughout the curriculum. Trisha is one of the leaders of the National Community-Based Research Networking Initiative, a Learn and Serve America-funded project hosted by Princeton in partnership with the Bonner Foundation. An anthropologist, Trisha's recent work explores how students, faculty members and communities change as a result of community-based research.
Shelley H. Billig
Shelley H. Billig is Vice President of RMC Research Corporation. Dr. Billig has authored or co-authored 12 books and dozens of articles on service-learning, including results of research studies, evaluations, and professional development initiatives in the K-12 and higher education arenas. She currently serves as editor of the Advances in Service-Learning Research book series and principal investigator of multiple Learn and Serve evaluations and independent studies of service-learning impact. She serves as K-12 program advisor to the National Service-Learning Clearinghouse and recently completed a national study of the impacts of service-learning participation on high school students.
Andrew Furco
Andrew Furco is Associate Vice President for Public Engagement at the University of Minnesota, where he also serves as an Associate Professor in the College of Education and Human Development and as Director of the University's International Center for Research on Public Engagement and Service-Learning. Prior to arriving in Minnesota, he served for 13 years as Director of the Service-Learning Research and Development Center at UC Berkeley. His research has focused on studying the impacts and institutionalization of service-learning in K-12 education, teacher education, and higher education. Through this research, he has worked to develop several metrics for the study of community engagement, including the Evaluation System for Experiential Education (ESEE), the Self-Assessment Rubric for Institutionalizing Service-Learning in Higher Education, and the "Service-Learning Civic Responsibility Survey for Higher Education".
Barbara E. Moely
Barbara E. Moely is Professor Emerita of Psychology and Research Affiliate of the Center for Public Service at Tulane University in New Orleans. She was the founding Director of the Office of Service Learning at Tulane and has led several funded efforts, including a consortium grant from Learn and Serve America, enhance capacity and expertise of service-learning programs in higher education. She has published research on the impacts of service-learning on college students and community partners, and currently conducts research for Tulane’s Center for Public Service, looking at college students’ service-learning participation and the development of community partnerships. She has presented her research at regional, national, and international conferences and has authored research reports for professional journals. She was a finalist for the 2002 Ehrlich Faculty Award for Service-Learning and received the Gulf-South Summit Award for Outstanding Contributions to Service-Learning Research in 2004.
Sherril Gelmon
Sherril Gelmon is Professor of Public Health in the Mark O. Hatfield School of Government, College of Urban and Public Affairs at Portland State University in Portland, Oregon, USA. Professor Gelmon focuses some of her research on the study of higher education policy, with specific applications to institutionalization of community engagement and related teaching strategies. Her current research on engagement relates to institutional strategy and establishment of models of faculty roles and recognition for community engaged scholarship. She was national evaluator for the “Community Engaged Scholarship for Health Collaborative”, funded by the US Department of Education, and is continuing as evaluator for the new “Faculty for the Engaged Campus” project, both through Community-Campus Partnerships for Health. She is completing a study of the ten-year impact of Portland State’s revised faculty tenure and promotion policies. She served as an “Engaged Scholar” with Campus Compact, developing and studying assessment methodologies with national disciplinary associations initiating major efforts in service-learning and civic engagement. She is a Senior Consultant with Community Campus Partnerships for Health; a member of the Campus Compact Service-Learning Consulting Corps; and a member of the National Review Board for the Scholarship of Engagement. She is the Chair of the International Association for Research on Service-learning and Community Engagement.
Cathy Jordan
Cathy Jordan, Pediatric Neuropsychologist by training, is Executive Director of the Children, Youth, and Family Consortium and an Associate Professor of Pediatrics and Neurology at the University of Minnesota. Dr. Jordan's research has focused on developmental neurotoxicology and her efforts have been concentrated on two large, longitudinal community-based participatory research projects; the Phillips Lead Poisoning Prevention Project, which studied the efficacy of a culture-specific peer education model for the primary prevention of lead poisoning, and the DREAMS Project (Developmental Research on Early Attention and Memory Skills), which studied the developmental effects of lead poisoning on attention, memory and behavior regulation in children of the Phillips Neighborhood. Through these projects she became intensely interested in models of research that aim to address community-defined needs and contribute to social and political change yet enhance scientific methodology and contribute valid information to our knowledge base. Her experience in Phillips highlighted the multiple barriers that researchers and community members face in conducting collaborative research, as well as the powerful role collaborative research can play in effecting real change in communities. She works at the local and national level to inform decisions about engaged research, teaching and service in the context of promotion and tenure guideline reforms. Dr. Jordan's future endeavors are likely to include enhancement of the research and teaching missions of the University via community partnerships and continued contemplation about, writing about, and engagement in public scholarship.
Marshall Welch
Marshall Welch is the Director of the Catholic Institute for Lasallian Social Action (CILSA) at Saint Mary’s College of California and oversees the service-learning program there. Prior to this he was the Director of the Lowell Bennion Community Service Center at the University of Utah and a professor in the School of Education. Marshall hosted the 3rd Annual International Conference on the Advances of Research in Service-learning in 2003 and co-edited the book published from that conference. He has made numerous scholarly presentations at conferences and conducted workshops on service-learning and civic engagement around the country and abroad. He is actively involved with Campus Compact at the national, regional, and state level, which includes hosting a training institute at sponsored by Campus Compact in October, 2004 in Salt Lake City.