Community-based Learning Courses: Reaching Across Campus

This case of campuswide community-based learning courses demonstrates the range of coursework in which academic content is connected to community projects. Higher education has been urged to expand upon the pedagogic importance of service experiences. Shulman (1991) has recommended that this expansion include making "public and community service a clinical component for the liberal arts and sciences." Portland State University has taken this suggestion seriously, and community-based learning experiences have become a campuswide phenomenon at this University. The display of "Community-based Learning Courses: Reaching Across the Campus" includes artifacts and photographs from Black studies and English courses, community products from speech communications and education courses, and video clips from math and sociology courses. Two specific examples of community-based learning courses are highlighted: Professor Joseph Poracsky’s geography course in which PSU students worked with public school teachers and student teams to develop skills in inventory mapping for the Green City Data Project, and Professor Milan Svoboda’s public health education course in which PSU students worked in community health agencies on tasks related to current health issues and also developed projects collaboratively with the agencies.