Public Engagement

The following essay was written by Robert King, Head of the University of Minnesota's Department of Applied Economics, in Minnesota Applied Economist No. 716 Fall 2005 / Winter 2006. It's a good example of how a strong, well-regarded department can incorporate public engagement into its curriculum and student experiences, and can reach out to community partners and alumni in innovative ways to provide new engagement opportunities for students.

On October 31 more than 100 participants in a University- wide forum explored the meaning and importance of public engagement in a great research university. The Web site for the newly established Office of Public Engagement defines engagement as follows.

…the partnership of university knowledge and resources with those of the public and private sectors to enrich scholarship, research, and creative activity; enhance curriculum, teaching, and learning; prepare educated, engaged citizens; strengthen democratic values and civic responsibility; address critical societal issues; and contribute to the public good.

This partnership is a two-way process. It is a logical extension and expansion of our traditional Land Grant mission through which the University and the broad community we serve, enrich and revitalize each other.

Student Engagement Plans Reach Beyond the Classroom

For me, one of the most exciting aspects of the new initiative on public engagement is the emphasis being placed on student involvement. Our department is already at the forefront of this effort. This past fall students in our orientation class (ApEc 1001), which is taught by Undergraduate Program Coordinator Gary Cooper, spent several sessions creating an “Intentional Plan of Engagement.� These sessions were led by staff from the University’s Office of Student Development. They were designed to help our students develop personalized plans for using experiences outside of the classroom to develop skills in five critical areas; adaptability, communications, conflict management, critical thinking, and development of meaningful relationships. A student’s plan might include volunteer activities, involvement with student organizations, study abroad, a research experience, and/ or an internship.

A group of students taking a “special problems� class on entrepreneurship with Professor Ward Nefstead put these concepts into action this past semester. With the help of the Southeast Sustainable Regional Partnership, they were contacted by an entrepreneur from southeast Minnesota interested in developing a business plan for a fruit processing operation. Working with the entrepreneur gave the students a great opportunity to develop their own skills in finance, planning, marketing, communications, and team building. The end result was a sound business plan and a great experience for our students.

Your Help Is Needed

Friends and alumni can help us offer more public engagement opportunities for our students. I would be happy to hear from you about ideas you have for projects and activities. Also, I encourage you to enter information on the St. Paul Campus Career Center “Building Bridges� Web site. The URL is as follows.

http://alumni.coafes.umn.edu/bb

This new initiative, developed in collaboration with the New College Alumni Society, gives alumni, friends, and potential employers a chance to share information that can help establish connections with our students. In the process, it will help us strengthen the partnerships that are the necessary foundation for effective public engagement.

Posted by Victor Bloomfield at 8:48 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Yesterday I participated in a very interesting small-group discussion at the Powderhorn Phillips Cultural Wellness Center (PPCWC) in south Minneapolis. The purpose of the meeting was to consider how to establish a community-based Institutional Review Board (IRB) to evaluate proposed research in communities. This is a very important issue for community-based research by research universities, one that I hope we'll make progress on.

We began, however, with an overview of the mission and philosophy of the PPCWC, presented by its very articulate Executive Director Atum Azzahir, Elder Consultant in African ways of knowing. The mission is “to unleash the power of citizens to heal themselves and to build community,� and a key statement of philosophy is

An indicator of health is engagement in healing and in community.
For cultural communities, conventional indicators of health do not adequately capture the process of what it takes to become healthy because of their exclusive focus on individual, physical indicators. While these are important to consider when discussing health, they should not be taken in isolation. They only represent one slice of the health story. Therefore, physical indicators must be part of an understanding of health together with cultural factors, such as beliefs, behaviors and lifestyle. These characterize people more holistically and affirm the role and impact of community and culture on health.

I'm struck by how integral the idea of community is to the health of individuals within that community. The contrast with the highly individual-focused ideas of most current medicine as practiced in the United States could not be greater. It's interesting to compare the PPCWC statement with that of the Center for Spirituality & Healing at the University of Minnesota:

Recognized nationally as a resource and leader in complementary therapies and healing practices, the University of Minnesota's Center for Spirituality & Healing's mission is to transform healthcare through innovative educational offerings, rigorous scientific research, inspiring outreach programs and integrative clinical services. The inspiration behind our work is the knowledge that health and well-being are enhanced when we integrate the best of complementary and conventional care.

The Center for Spirituality & Healing probably comes the closest of all University of Minnesota health enterprises to the philosophy of PPCWC, but there's still a huge gap in the individualist vs. community approaches.

The Cultural Wellness Center web site states that it "has been in the business of creating, developing, testing and implementing models that increase the effectiveness of institutions attempting to improve community health." It is partnering with a variety of "mainstream" instiutions (Hennepin County, Abbott Northwestern Hospital, the University of Minnesota, the College of Saint Catherine, the Otto Bremer Foundation) to develop and test various models.

It will be important to learn whether this culturally-specific community approach to health, partnered with the resources of modern medicine and institutions of the dominant culture, will be more successful than the not very successful standard approaches in improving health in the Powderhorn-Phllips Community.

Posted by Victor Bloomfield at 8:39 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Last night we had the awards dinner for the recipients of the Josie R. Johnson Human Rights and Social Justice Award and the Outstanding Community Service Award.

The Josie R. Johnson Award was established in honor of Dr. Josie R. Johnson in recognition of her lifelong contributions to human rights and social justice, which guided her work with the civil rights movement, years of community service, and tenure at the University of Minnesota. The award seeks to honor one University of Minnesota faculty or staff member and one student who, through their principles and practices, exemplify Dr. Johnson’s standard of excellence in creating respectful and inclusive living, learning, and working environments. This year the awardees were

• Ora Hokes, a community activist and non-traditional student, and
  
• Grant Anderson, a coordinator of residential life.

The Outstanding Community Service Award recognizes outstanding contributions and accomplishments faculty, staff, or community members who have devoted their time and talent to make substantial enduring contributions to the community and improving public life and the well being of society. Such contributions and accomplishments must result in long-term and lasting changes for the public good and demonstrate an unusual commitment to the University and the greater Minnesota community. This year's winners are

• Vernon B. Cardwell, Morse-Alumni Distinguished Teaching Professor, Department of Agronomy and Plant Genetics

• David Feinberg, Associate Professor, Department of Art

• Corliss Outley, Assistant Professor, School of Kinesiology

• Mark Umbreit, Professor, School of Social Work

• Jacquelyn Zita, Associate Professor, Department of Women’s Studies

The work of the recipients with their community partners is remarkable, but equally remarkable is the spirit of recognition and celebration at the awards ceremony. Public engagement work in the university tends to be viewed as a distant third, behind research and teaching. The awards dinner gives us an opportunity to gather with like-minded colleagues, family, friends, and partners to recognize that this work is not isolated or unappreciated. Lots of people are in the room, including a reasonable number of high-level university administrators. Conversations and energy run strong. The stories told by the recipients testify not just to their warm hearts and strong values, but also to their high academic standards put to use in innovative ways for community betterment. The diversity of these stories tells us of the many ways in which the university serves society.

The university is itself a community, and our gathering to celebrate engagement provides an important opportunity to renew and extend the bonds of our community.

Posted by Victor Bloomfield at 9:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Last Sunday morning I went to the panel discussion with artists and scholars on "Arts and Diaspora", one of the arts-related events of the final weekend of the University Symposium on "The Politics of Populations" sponsored by the Institute for Advanced Study.

The listed participants included

• Sandy Agustin of Intermedia Arts, an organzation that "uses art as a catalyst to build bridges between people";
• Ananya Chatterjea, of the Ananya Dance Theater and Associate Professor in the Department of Theater Arts and Dance;
• Evelyn Davidheiser, Director of the U's Institute for Global Studies
• Louis Mendoza, Chair of the Department of Chicano Studies; and
• Abdi Roble, photographer, whose strong black and white photos documenting the Somali diaspora surrounded the conference room and can be seen at the website of the Somali Documentary Project.

Also participating in the discussion were other members of the Somali Documentary Project and Ananya Dance Theater, undergraduate students, and faculty and staff from the Institute for Advanced Studies.

Although it was made abundantly clear that the arts provide a powerful vehicle to share the stories of immigrants, discussion moved fairly quickly from the specifics of arts connected to diaspora to broader issues of the arts in a race-conscious, and often racist, society. Some of the points that were made:

• Community artists need other sponsors and sites, to "visit each others houses".
• The schools are dropping arts instruction, and have no sense of cultural competence in working with students of color.
• The university needs and wants to engage with communities of color, but there is a history of mistrust. The arts could be a place where they could meet in equal partnership.
• Minnesota should be proud of its history in supporting the arts. It was the second state to establish a state arts council (Utah was first), and did so well before most of the others. But despite generous support of the arts, there are great racial disparities in many areas (health, education, housing, jobs); and even in the arts, support goes mainly to the big organizations and has contracted since 9/11.
• If we want diverse outcomes, we need a diversity of people at the table. We need an "investment of knowing" what is happening in the various cultural communities, and must surrender our "privilege of silence" to speak up about racial and ethnic balance.

Further grappling with issues such as these needs to be at the forefront of public engagement efforts at the University of Minnesota and similar institutions.

Perhaps it is suitable to end with a quote from Wole Soyinka, the Nigerian Nobel Prize-winning writer, in the latest issue of Poets & Writers: "[A]rt in any form is a social activity, and any creative endeavor that enlarges the horizon of the human being, the human entity, in any way, is already not art for art's sake." He continues, however "What the danger is, is when writers allow themselves to become manipulated into believing that their work has to have some very specific social relevance... When I pick up a book, I don't want to deal with some instant political relevance. Otherwise, life becomes very boring."

Posted by Victor Bloomfield at 11:35 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

On Friday, Harry Boyte and his colleagues at the University of Minnesota's Center for Democracy and Citizenship received the very good news reported in the press release below. This grant from the Kellogg Foundation is an affirmation of so many key things: the Minnesota tradition as a leader in civic values and innovation, the hard work and deep but practical thinking of the CDC and its collaborators from a wide range of public life, the willingness of a prominent foundation to invest in a well-conceived partnership between the university and other civic organizations, and - crucially - the importance of "a long-term initiative to revitalize and strengthen civic life and civic values".

MINNEAPOLIS/ST. PAUL (4/21/06)—The Center for Democracy and Citizenship (CDC) at the Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs has received a $320,000 grant from the W.K. Kellogg Foundation (Battle Creek, MI) to support Minnesota Works Together, a long-term initiative to revitalize and strengthen civic life and civic values in Minnesota.  

In its first phase, Minnesota Works Together will sponsor several projects, including public forums and house meetings on civic values and renewal, education opportunities on civic skills, and a Twin Cities Public Television documentary on civic life in Minnesota. The organizers also plan to put the “civic impact� of public policies on the political agenda, building on earlier bipartisan work the CDC coordinated with the Clinton administration. The overall goal is to strengthen the capacities of individuals, communities, and institutions to work together to create healthy civic life.  

“Researchers have reported negative civic trends across the country. In discussions that CDC staff members have had with citizens in Minnesota, we have found these trends here as well. People are frustrated by bitter and unproductive partisan divisions, worried about tensions between immigrants and native born Americans, and concerned about a declining sense of community in general,� said Harry Boyte, Humphrey Institute senior fellow and co-director of the center. “At the same time, we have found many, many positive examples of civic renewal in some communities.  

There is a common belief that Minnesota can and should be a leader in renewing the country’s vibrant, democratic society. Minnesota is a civic laboratory for the nation.� Ramsey County Commissioner Toni Carter, a member of a statewide leadership team developed to work on the project, remarked on the legacy of civic action in Minnesota and the importance of rebuilding a vital civic culture. “Minnesota has such a wonderful civic heritage of citizens and government working together on tough problems, from schools and jobs to battling discrimination and restoring the environment,� said Carter. “We simply can’t let this heritage slip away. It is our greatest asset for the 21st century.�  

Carter is joined on the state leadership team by a bi-partisan group of leaders including former Gov. Al Quie, William Doherty, professor of family social science at the University of Minnesota, Rev. Peg Chemberlin, executive director of the Minnesota Council of Churches, Gary Cunningham, CEO of NorthPoint Health and Wellness Center, Kent Eklund, president of the Fairview Foundation, and other civic leaders.  

Minnesota Works Together will use the talents and networks of the state leadership team and other civic, religious, and educational organizations to make this a collaborative and sustainable effort. For example, the Council of Churches is interested in hosting public forum discussions on civic action. The Citizens League, the Minnesota Council of Nonprofits, and others will take part in an ongoing civic roundtable.  

“We have nicknamed this initiative the ‘me to we’ project. People have expressed the desire for greater skills and connections among people of diverse backgrounds to work together to strengthen civic life,� said Boyte. “We cannot simply continue to focus on ‘me first.’ We need to get back to the idea that it takes a village to raise a child – or to build a healthy civic community.�  

For more information on the Minnesota Works Together initiative, contact Boyte at (612) 625-5509. To learn more about the center and its activities, visit CDC online at www.publicwork.org.

Posted by Victor Bloomfield at 8:48 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

To celebrate the closing of its year-long University Symposium on "The Politics of Populations", the Institute for Advanced Study at the University of Minnesota is presenting A Celebration of Arts and Diaspora. Running from today (April 21) through April 23, the Celebration features a weekend of poetry, films, photographs, dance, discussion, and musical performances, showcasing artists from local communities as well as invited guests. The complete listing of events is at http://www.ias.umn.edu/arts&diaspora.php.

The symposium has featured "public discussions on urgent concerns ranging from immigration policy to preparing for the next pandemic to the tragedy of genocide, and scholarly research ranging from demographic history to multicultural encounters in ethnic borderlands to changing technologies of population surveillance and administration." It has tried to bring together a wide range of University of Minnesota and Twin Cities resources on these crucial topics, integrating approaches that tend to be separate and fragmented. To quote from the Symposium web site:

Currently, conversations about the politics of populations take place in somewhat specialized circles, often in isolation from each other. Much is to be gained by bringing these different discussions together in creative new ways—for example by bringing immigration historians into dialogue with members of new immigrant communities and with the policymakers who shape their options. Or, in the case of current concerns about pandemics, much could be gained by conversations that involve the perspectives of demography, cultural anthropology, and public health. "The Politics of Populations" will pursue these intersections—across the disciplines and between academic and public participants—through a series of interdisciplinary research collaboratives, graduate seminars, undergraduate honors colloquia, and public events during the academic year 2005-06. The rich resources of the University in relevant areas—for example, the faculty and students affiliated with the Minnesota Population Center, the Institute for Global Studies, the Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies, the Human Rights Program, and the Immigration History Research Center in CLA; the Law School’s Human Rights Center; the International Women's Rights Action Watch at the Humphrey Institute for Public Policy; and the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy of the School of Public Health—make the University of Minnesota an ideal place to start these conversations. These issues concern scholars and citizens in our state, and also are of national and international urgency.

Posted by Victor Bloomfield at 9:44 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Another winner of a University of Minnesota Outstanding Community Service Award for 2006 is Jacquelyn Zita, Associate Professor in the Department of Women's Studies. Professor Zita was recognized for her work with the Women's Environmental Institute at Amador Hill, where she is Director of Education and Operations.

Prof. Zita publishes in the area of women's issues from "a biological, philosophical, and historical feminist perspective". Her current research activities include

• Research on scientific research on the unregulated environmental crisis in the American home.
  
• Caustic Spring: Mapping Pesticide-Related Pathologies in Minnesota
  
• Material Girl in a Chemical World: Reflections on Postmodernity, Environmental Crisis and the Female Body

She comes to this unusual set of research interests from an unusual but pertinent educational background: B.A. in Biology and Chemistry, and Ph.D. in Philosophy, all at Washington University in St. Louis. She has been Chair of the Department of Women's Studies, President of the National Women's Studies Association, and recipient of the University's major undergraduate teaching award.

The Women’s Environmental Institute at Amador Hill is "an environmental research, renewal and retreat center designed to create and share knowledge about environmental issues and policies relevant to women, children and identified communities especially affected by environmental injustices; to promote organic and sustainable agriculture skill building and ecological awareness; and to promote activism that influences public policy and promotes social change."

The WEI website lists six programmatic objectives dedicated to:

• create knowledge, scholarship and educational materials for individuals or groups working on environmental issues related to women, children, and disproportionately impacted communities
  
• become an information hub that organizes current research and writing on environmental issues related to women, children, and identified communities
  
• demonstrate leadership in civic involvement, global responsibility and stewardship around environmental issues at both the local and global level
  
• provide both on-site and off-site educational outreach in seminars (and eventually distant learning courses) and experiential learning workshops on practical activities related to sustainable agriculture and environmental issues
  
• develop strong affiliations with local environmental and ecologically-focused groups and secondary and post-secondary institutions to create collaborative programming and projects
  
• create an institute that will provide a model for environmentally-friendly construction, land stewardship and conservation practices, renewable energy, resource development, and organic food production and processing.

This broad program melds many aspects of science with equally many social and political issues. It is a great example of how engaged scholarship on significant community problems requires a multidisciplinary approach, and how an engaged scholar can combine her own broad training and experience with a wide range of community partners to achieve important results.

Posted by Victor Bloomfield at 8:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hy Berman, a Professor in the Department of History, was one of the recipients of the 2002 Outstanding Community Service Awards. Hy is a remarkable member of the University of Minnesota community. He's an historian of high repute, specializing in the history of American labor and immigration. But he's best known on campus and throughout the state for his work in connecting these themes to ongoing life in Minnesota through presentations on radio and television. These presentations have made him arguably the University's leading "media star". The citation of his Outstanding Community Service Award reads

Professor Berman has dedicated himself to taking history into the community to advance its relationship to current events and the real world around us. He has educated the citizens of the state about the impact of Minnesota history on contemporary local, state, national, and international events. As a public historian and, as one endorser of the nomination called him, “the face in the community who symbolizes the University of Minnesota,� Dr. Berman has made a lasting contribution to the well-being of society.

Each Outstanding Community Service Award winner acknowledges his or her community partners at the award banquet. Prof. Berman's are an unusual bunch for an academic: Twin Cities Public Television; Media Services Incorporated: Public Affairs, Counseling, and Media Relations; Minnesota Public Radio; and KARE 11 TV News.

During April, 2005, the Twin Cities weekly public affairs program, Almanac, "asked historian Hy Berman to come up with the five biggest things that have changed in Minnesota during the past 20 years." The first four items on the list, at the Almanac web site where you can watch the clips in RealVideo, are

• Minnesota's Growing Racial Diversity
• Minnesota's Changing Economy
• Minnesota's Changing Demographics
• Minnesota's Changing Politics
• Internationalizing Minnesota

To see and hear the fifth, you'll have to go to the RealVideo of Almanac's 20th Anniversary broadcast.

Those of us who value public engagement, and wish that we could do it more and better, cannot but envy Hy Berman's gift and commitment.

Posted by Victor Bloomfield at 9:05 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Today's entry is a guest blog by Dennis Donovan, National Organizer for Public Achievement, Center for Democracy and Citizenship, Hubert H. Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs, University of Minnesota

“Ideas are great, but relationships get things done,� said Russell Lyons. “We must do democracy differently if we are to create a better world,� said Samantha Rydzik. In reading these words, one might assume that Russ is a seasoned activist and that Samantha is articulating an idea developed over years of grassroots organizing. In fact, they’re young leaders in a Public Achievement team at the University of Minnesota who wanted to make a difference. This spring, they and other students formed the Student Committee on Public Engagement in order to work on issues that are important to them. As a first step, they held a Civic Summit on March 31 attended by students, faculty, staff and members of the Dean’s cabinet.

What is Public Achievement?
Public Achievement is an international democracy movement that is grounded in the theory and practice of ordinary people doing public work. The program was created in 1990 by the Center for Democracy and Citizenship at the University’s Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs to give people a process and the skills to become co-creators of their world.

At Public Achievement sites, participants work in teams with a coach. They choose a public issue that is important to them, then develop and carry out an action plan that addresses some aspect of that issue. Coaches help the team members develop civic skills such as public speaking, running a meeting, and interacting with public officials. By working with people of different values and perspectives, participants learn how to work together in a democratic group. They learn the complexities of serious public issues, and how evaluation and self-reflection can turn mistakes and setbacks into learning opportunities. They learn how to get things done.

Public Achievement Success Stories – from the West Bank of the University of Minnesota to the West Bank and Gaza
The Public Achievement model is now being used by individuals and institutions around the world.

At the University of Minnesota, students in the Leadership Minor Program, in Professor James Farr’s course on Practicing Democratic Education, and at the Humphrey Institute do Public Achievement. In the 3000-level Leadership Minor class, students have worked on issues including bike theft on campus, affordable housing, and transportation. For over 12 years, students in Professor Farr’s course have been coaching Public Achievement teams at St. Bernard School in St. Paul. Currently, public affairs graduate students at the Humphrey Institute are organizing and facilitating community dialogues on civic values as part of the Center for Democracy and Citizenship’s Minnesota Works Together initiative.

At Colgate University in New York, Dean of the College Adam Weinberg is using Public Achievement to transform the “Club Med-like atmosphere� of his campus into a laboratory for public problem solvers. Students in the Urban Teacher Program at Minneapolis Community and Technical College are using Public Achievement to learn community organizing and public leadership skills, so they can effectively model active citizenship for their future students.

Internationally, the American Friends Service Committee has used Public Achievement with over 2,000 young people in the Palestinian territories of the West Bank and Gaza. Public Achievement teams have worked successfully to get electric street lights, build bus shelters, add computer centers in schools, and find resources to provide ambulance service to villages where there is no emergency medical care.

Public Achievement is also used in Northern Ireland, Scotland, Turkey, Israel, and Eastern Europe. The Center for Democracy and Citizenship is currently exploring ways to create citizen to citizen learning experiences between groups in the United States and abroad.

Renewing Civic Life
Ordinary people have used the theory and practice of Public Achievement to take action to improve our world. They have informed and educated the public about important issues using videos, books, marches, murals and forums. They have changed policies in schools and communities, and influenced legislation. Public Achievement teams have built playgrounds, parks and community gardens. Through their public work, people like Russ and Samantha have developed confidence, built powerful relationships, and learned that politics is not only something politicians do, but something we can all do. This is how we renew civic life.

Posted by Victor Bloomfield at 11:51 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Issues of access to healthy foods, proper nutrition, and child obesity in urban communities have emerged as crucial in the past few years.

A public engagement symposium on Healthy Foods in Minneapolis Urban Communities: Economic, Policy, and Community Strategies to Improve Healthy Food Access was held in March 2006 in Minneapolis. It brought together researchers and community leaders to identify and discuss issues related to healthy food access in lower income Minneapolis communties. An introduction by Simone French was followed by presentations by Ephraim Leibtag, Jean Kinsey, Ken Meter, and John Seltzer. Community presenters included Bernadette Longo, Angela Dawson, and Theresa Carr.

The slides from this symposium are now available on the obesity prevention center website:
http://www.obesityprevention.umn.edu/obp/rescenter/presentations.html.

These presentations, in pdf format, are large and may take a while to download. However, they are full of important information and analysis, and worth careful attention.

Posted by Victor Bloomfield at 10:04 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

One of the 2006 winners of the University of Minnesota Outstanding Community Service Awards is David Feinberg, Associate Professor in the Department of Art.

For the past four years Professor Feinberg has been in partnership with the Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies as director/producer of the ongoing Voice To Vision video documentary project. These documentaries record the process of survivors of genocide working with an interdisciplinary team of diverse student and professional artists to transform their experiences into works of art.

Professor Feinberg is also directing a similar video project for the Council On Public Engagement called ACTION (Artist/Community Teams Interpret Oral Narratives). This project includes the Northside Artists Collective, North Minneapolis, in conjunction with MTN (Minneapolis Television Network), The Franklin Library, Phillips Neighborhood, in conjunction with PCTV (Phillips Community TV), and City Passport, a partnership of the city of Saint Paul, Healtheast, and the Minnesota Creative Arts and Aging Network.

Since 1996 David Feinberg has been a volunteer instructor for the-Osher Lifelong Learning Institute in the College of Continuing Education, teaching a course "Drawing From Fresh Ideas" in which potential drawing and painting graduate teaching assistants try out their experimental art lessons on senior citizens. Fourteen years ago he started a critique group for area artists working independently. There are now three critique groups with over forty active members. In addition, since 1984, he has been a juror and lecturer at over 38 area art exhibitions that include colleges, community art organizations and centers, and high school regional competitions. A sampling of his work is here.

The work of Professor Feinberg is an exemplar of how the fine arts can strongly connect with the real world.

Posted by Victor Bloomfield at 9:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Today's entry is from the Community-Campus Partnerships for Health (CCPH). Thanks to Sarena Seifer of CCPH for sending it along.

Registration now open!
http://depts.washington.edu/ccph/conf-registration.html

Community-Campus Partnerships for Health's 9th Conference
Walking the Talk: Achieving the Promise of Authentic Partnerships
May 31 - June 3, 2006
Minneapolis, Minnesota USA
http://depts.washington.edu/ccph/conf-overview.html

We invite you to join hundreds of colleagues who - like you - are passionate about the power of partnerships to transform communities and academe. Gain knowledge and and skills in service-learning, community-based participatory research, community and economic development, partnership sustainability and more!

Featured Keynote Speakers:

• Loretta Jones, Executive Director, Healthy African American Families
  
• Angela Glover Blackwell, Founder and CEO, PolicyLink
  

Plenary Panel of Funding Agency Representatives:

• Joan Cleary, Associate Director of the Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota Foundation
  
• Sarah Flicker, Chief Research Scientist of the Wellesley Central Health Corporation
  
• Juli Kaufmann, Director of the Healthier Wisconsin Partnership Program
  
• Francisco Sy, Chief of the Office of Community-Based Participatory Research and Outreach in the National Center on Minority Health and Health Disparities at the National Institutes of Health
  
• Terri D. Wright, Program Director at the WK Kellogg Foundation
  

Register for a Pre-Conference Institute - Space is Limited!
Pre-conference institutes on Wednesday, May 31, 2006 provide participants
with in-depth knowledge and skills. Topics include:

• Engaging Campuses as Authentic Partners: Tips & Strategies for Community Leaders
  
• Essentials of Service-Learning Partnerships
  
• Community-Based Participatory Research: Developing & Sustaining Partnerships
  
• Practical Guidance for Authors Writing About Community-Based Participatory Research
  
• Making Your Best Case for Promotion and/or Tenure: A Toolkit for Community-Engaged Faculty Members
  
• Walk in My Shoes: Participatory Learning that Strengthens Partnerships
  
• Community-Campus Partnerships and Rural Health Workforce Development: A Pre-Conference Institute and Community Site Visit
  

Preview Conference Sessions - Now Available Online! A brief description of each skill-building workshop, story session, thematic poster session and poster that will be presented at this year's conference is available at
http://depts.washington.edu/ccph/conf-program.html#Agenda

Financial Support Available for Community-Based Participants from Minnesota, Wisconsin, North Dakota, and Montana - Funding is provided through a generous grant from the Otto Bremer Foundation to defray the costs of conference registration and/or lodging. Applications must be received by mail or fax no later than Monday, April 17, 2006 at 5 pm PST. See details at http://www.ccph.info

Academic Credit Option - New This Year! Through a partnership with the Summer 2006 Public Health Institute (PHI) sponsored by the School of
Public Health at the University of Minnesota, participants of CCPH's
9th Conference now have the option of receiving academic credit while
attending the conference. For more information, visit
http://www.sph.umn.edu/publichealthplanet/ or contact PHI at 612-625-2954.

Become a Conference Exhibitor and Co-Sponsor! Exhibitors and co-sponsors
are essential to the success of the conference by directly connecting
attendees to valuable programs, products and services. Meet our current
co-sponsors at http://depts.washington.edu/ccph/conf-coexhibit.html. Find
out how your organization can join this esteemed group by visiting
http://depts.washington.edu/ccph/conf-exhibiting.html.

Save the Date! CCPH 10th Anniversary Conference: April 11 - 14,
2007, in Toronto. The call for conference session and poster proposals
will be released this summer. Stay tuned for details at http://www.ccph.info

Questions? Visit http://depts.washington.edu/ccph/conf-contacts.html
or contact Anne Moreau, CCPH program assistant at (206) 543-8178 or ccphuw@u.washington.edu.

We look forward to seeing you in Minneapolis this Spring!

Posted by Victor Bloomfield at 1:09 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Yesterday I talked with the University of Minnesota Student Senate about our Public Engagement efforts. I told them that the U has struggled to find a small number of representative metrics for engagement, and has decided on three: citizen satisfaction (from an annual survey), intellectual property commercialization, and student participation in public engagement activities (from a biennial survey of graduating seniors).

One of the student senators asked why intellectual property commercialization was one of the measures. I told him that the university's role in job creation and the economic development of the state was validly considered an important aspect of engagement. As luck would have it, I was able to illustrate the point with an unusual example: the Honeycrisp apple.

As related in a U of MN news release, "The Honeycrisp apple, developed by University of Minnesota researchers and introduced to the public in 1991, has been named one of 25 Innovations That Changed the World." The choice was made by the Association of University Technology Managers (AUTM) in their Better World Report. The Honeycrisp is in honorable company: the other 24 include Google, the V-chip, and the nicotine patch.

The story goes on to say

...AUTM points out that the Honeycrisp's contributions go well beyond flavor. Upper Midwest apple growers were faced with tough times in the '80s and '90s, as apples from Washington state and overseas were dominating the market, and locally grown apples were, at times, being sold for less than they cost to produce.

Honeycrisp came along in the early 1990s as a premium apple at a premium price (often retailing for $2.50 a pound), but orchards found that the public was hungry for the apples and willing to pay the price, and their profits rose accordingly. The report notes that one third of the growers for Pepin Heights Orchard Inc. went out of business during the '90s, but those who switched to Honeycrisp apples are now doing well.

Contribution to the economic well-being of growers and their employees is indeed a valid measure of public engagement.

Posted by Victor Bloomfield at 9:36 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Through last Friday's STEM conference, I learned about the Minnesota Minority Education Partnership, Inc. MMEP is "a nonprofit collaborative, founded in 1987, that seeks to increase the success of Minnesota students of color in Minnesota schools, colleges, and universities.  MMEP achieves its mission by working closely with students, the communities of color and representatives from education, business, government and nonprofits to develop programs that help students of color succeed academically."

In this way, it strongly prefigures the purpose and dramatis personae of the STEM conference. It seems that there's nothing new under the sun, except - importantly - active support by the Governor and the Minnesota Department of Education. And it's a strength that MMEP's Executive Director is Carlos Mariani Rosa, who is also a State Representative.

Some of the characteristics of the MMEP design, according to its web site, include:

• MMEP is a multi-sector collaborative, dedicated to having educators, public officials, philanthropists, business people, nonprofits, students and parents at the table.
• MMEP focuses its work on kindergarten through postsecondary education and promotes a continuum of support at all levels.
• MMEP is a multicultural organization dedicated to having the diversity of Minnesota communities represented in all components of the organization.
• MMEP's financing structure requires that one third of its core-operating budget come from membership fees, one third come from a state appropriation and one third come from grants.
• The Implementation Working Group has the ability to adjust the work plan of the organization whenever it is necessary to assure appropriate advocacy and programming on behalf of Minnesota communities of color.
• The work of MMEP is as dedicated to the process of collaboration as it is to its programs/products.

MMEP's Associate Director, Jennifer Godinez, is also Director of the MMEP-associated Minnesota College Access Network (MCAN). The goal of MCAN is to "increase college enrollment and graduation among Minnesota students by significantly increasing the number of students who participate in college access programming in Minnesota." Access to demanding college-prep work, particularly algebra and higher math, beginning in 8th grade and continuing throughout high school, has been shown to be essential to college success in the STEM disciplines.

MCAN plans to use grants and technical support to

• increase the number of college access programs,
• expand the efforts of existing college access programs,
• partner with K-12 school districts and communities, and
• serve as a statewide coordinating body for college access programs.

MMEP and MCAN are the types of focused, pragmatic programs that we need if we are to make the benefits of higher education - both personal and societal - accessible to today's and tomorrow's students.

Posted by Victor Bloomfield at 9:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Yesterday I wrote about the conference "Creating Minnesota's Plan for Career Development in Science, Technology, Engineering, & Math". The morning roundtable session had some important observations about the role of parents in building the success of their children, a role that is often problematic in poor, stressed families:

• Kids respond to positive adults in their lives, whether parents, mentors, caregivers, or custodians.
  
• Family is critical, but reaching parents may be a challenge. There are economic and cultural issues that may keep parents from supporting the aspirations of their kids, or from recognizing that strong and continuing education is crucial to their kids' success.
  
• We need more and better resources outside the home to enable parents to support their children.
  
• Better use of after-school time, while parents are at work and kinds are now often at loose ends, would lead to more learning and a more productive day.
  
• Business wants to know how to help. One way is to realize that many of their employees are also parents, so that parental support and education programs could be part of the workplace experience in progressive companies.
  

Promising access to higher education is an empty promise if the students who most need financial help to attend college don't have access to the information and skills that would enable them to avail themselvves of the aid.

Posted by Victor Bloomfield at 12:42 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Last Friday, March 31, I participated in a conference "Creating Minnesota's Plan for Career Development in Science, Technology, Engineering, & Math" arranged by the Citizens League, the Minnesota Department of Education, and the Science Museum of Minnesota. The conference participants included a wide range of leaders from business, education, government, and non-profit organizations, and featured an address by Governor Tim Pawlenty.

The conference was motivated by these sobering challenges facing Minnesota:

• 20-33% projected increases in scientific and technical occupations in ten years
  
• 10% decrease in the number of high school graduates by 2013
  
• 52% increases in the number of graduate students of color, while Caucasian graduates decrease 18.7%
  
• 20-40 point spreads between Caucasians and other cultural groups in science and math college readiness
  
• 51% of superintendents report difficulty or great difficulty in filling science teaching positions
  
• Only an average of 56.5% of newly hired teachers are still teaching after four years
  

• To come to a common understanding of these challenges Minnesota faces in meeting the science, thechnology, engineering, and math (STEM) workforce needs of the future
  
• To create a high-level shared vision to increase the number of STEM graduates across all cultural groups and income levels and to promote a higher level of STEM literacy for all graduates
  
• To establish high-level priorities and strategies toward this vision involving business, education, government, and non-profit organizations within communities and across the state of Minnesota
  

This sort of public engagement, in which the university is not seen mainly as a dispenser of expertise but rather as one component of the broader social system, makes explicit one of our most important roles in society.

Posted by Victor Bloomfield at 10:44 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)