HENCE
As public engagement efforts grow and ramify around the country, the need increases for national coordination and leadership. A February 2006 Wingspread Conference on "Creating the Higher Education Network on Community Engagement" has led to the establishment of an organization, HENCE, that plans to assume that role. This promises to be a very important effort. Here is the mission statement from the HENCE web site.
"The Higher Education Network for Community Engagement (HENCE) is a response to the growing need to deepen, consolidate, and advance the literature, research, practice, policy, and advocacy for community engagement as a core element of higher education's role in society. Increasingly, higher education institutions are intentionally connecting academic work to public purposes through extensive partnerships that involve faculty, staff, and students in active collaboration with communities. This idea of "community engagement" is renewing the civic mission of higher education and transforming academic culture in ways that are both exciting and challenging.
HENCE represents a new, high level of commitment to cooperation across diverse engagement-related organizations to provide support for the next phase of growth and improvement. On February 24, 2006, at the Wingspread Conference Center in Racine, Wisconsin, individuals representing several national organizations agreed on the following network objectives:
- Create a national network coordinated across leadership organizations
- Develop a coordinated approach to providing resources and data
- Encourage local, state, regional, and national meetings (formal and informal)
- Implement a coordinated agenda for advocacy
- Create an agenda for professional development and recognition
- Celebrate institutional differences
HENCE organizations committed to meeting these objectives by forming workgroups on these related tasks:
- Organize resources for and meetings among higher education lobbyists for advocacy at state and national levels
- Provide publications, web resources, training, and events for promoting community engagement at regional and national levels
- Collaborate on common data measures and dissemination of promising practices
- Develop models and provide support for quality scholarship of engagement
- Provide professional development opportunities for higher education leaders"
Links:
About HENCE: http://www.henceonline.org/about
Wingspread Report: http://www.henceonline.org/about/founding_documents