Community-engaged learning at UVM is a teaching strategy that integrates community analysis or engagement with instruction and critical reflection.  This pedagogy enables students to apply disciplinary knowledge in real-world contexts, to develop capacities for civic and social action, and to address community-identified priorities. 

Community engagement: the reciprocal exchange of knowledge + resources between campuses and their off-campus partners.

 _{– based on the Carnegie Classification for Community Engagement}

At UVM, the umbrella term “community-engaged learning” is used to encompass two course designation types – Community-Learning and Service-Learning. These courses share:

• A focus on community assets and contexts
• The use of critical reflection
• Identifying or pursuing avenues for effective social or civic action

Courses differ in whether students work directly with partners, and whether those partners are on or off-campus.  (See the designation guidelines).

The University of Vermont has a distinguished history of community-engaged teaching and learning. As the alma mater of John Dewey, and in his hometown of Burlington, UVM is committed to community engagement and experiential education as key foundations for engaged citizenship. CELO continues in this tradition, supporting pathways for students to engage in communities throughout their time at UVM and beyond.

Founded in 2003, the Office of Community-Engaged Learning (then called CUPS – Community-University Partnerships + Service-Learning) grew out of a federal Housing + Urban Development grant funding Community Outreach Partnership Centers (COPC).  Psychology faculty member Lynne Bond and others led the formation of a COPC in the Old North End, with students in multiple departments working with Neighborhood Planning Assemblies.  When the grant ended, CUPS was created to provide an institutional home for service-learning at UVM. 

The Faculty Fellows program had been started by Lynne Bond and other leaders in 1999, to support faculty working with the COPC.  For many years, it was a state-wide training, run collaboration with Vermont Campus Compact, a chapter of the national organization devoted to the civic purpose of higher education. The Faculty Fellows came home to UVM in 2015 and has been run for UVM faculty since that time. 

CELO is now housed in the Division of Faculty Affairs (DOFA), under the leadership of Vice Provost Jane Okech, in recognition of our primary role of training and supporting faculty and collaborating with other faculty development units on campus.  We work closely with other outreach and engagement units, including Civic Engagement (Student Life) and the Office of Engagement and Leahy Institute for Rural Partnerships (Vice President for Research).