Community Engagement for the Public Good

Office: Community Commons, Suite 1100
Mail Code: 2055 E. Evans Ave. Suite 1100 Denver, CO 80208
Phone: 303-871-3706
Web Site: https://academicaffairs.du.edu/ccesl

The 12-credit undergraduate certificate in Community Engagement for the Public Good offered by the Center for Community Engagement to advance Scholarship and Learning (CCESL) equips students with the skills, knowledge, and commitments necessary to collaborate with communities for the public good. Students will learn the foundations of community-engaged methods and develop their action plan through a series of 2-credit courses, CENG 2510 Denver Urban Issues and Policy, CENG 2520 Community Organizing, and CENG 2590 From Public Good Theory to Action. Then, throughout six credits of independent study (CENG 3890, Pathways to the Public Good) and/or community-engaged coursework, students will receive the mentoring needed to effectively carry out and reflect on their action plan. Specifically, through the sequence of courses in the certificate program, students will: 1) understand critical issues within the Denver metro area and community efforts to address these issues, 2) explore social change strategies and learn skills that will allow them to work toward the public good and social change, 3) develop a personal action plan, grounded in anti-oppression analysis, that they can implement to address a social justice issue of their choosing, 4) carry out community-engaged signature work based on their personal action plan, and 5) reflect on their signature work through an ePortfolio.

To meet these outcomes, students will build a set of knowledge, skills, and commitments through CCESL’s four pathways to authentic, ethical community-engaged work: Think, Connect, Act, Reflect. In Reflect: A Pathway to Commitment, students commit to act for the public good by considering their place within community and their responsibility to others, engaging in civic professionalism, understanding their strengths, and discerning what they can do to work toward the change they seek. During Think: A Pathway to Actionable Knowledge, students learn civic and democratic processes, a variety of potential social change actions, and to contextualize a social justice issue. Through Connect: A Pathway to Skillful Relationships, students learn to develop relationships rooted in reciprocity, mutuality, and collaboration. Finally, in Act: A Pathway to Being a Skillful Agent of Change, students learn skills to inform their action, including how to use an anti-oppression analysis, and then work collaboratively for social change.