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Civic Engagement Classes
2007-2008 (partial list)
The following classes have integrated into course work collaborative research and work with community groups on issues of public concern. Course pedagogies encompass service-learning, community-based research, internships, and policy research, as required or optional components of the syllabus.
During the 2007/08 academic year, the following departments offered courses with a civic engagement component.
- American Studies
- Art
- Biology
- Educational Studies
- English
- Environmental Studies
- Geography
- Hispanic Studies
- Humanities Media and Cultural Studies
- International Studies
- Political Science
- Psychology
- Sociology
- Theatre and Dance
The list excludes courses that only have field trips without a community-based project and courses in which research is only intended for an academic audience without a public component. This is only a partial list, based on information provided by professors, on-line syllabi, and department coordinators. If you know of additional courses that should be added, please contact Paul Schadewald.
Fall 2007
Art - 3D Design
Stan Sears
A series of three-dimensional projects using a basic visual language of line, texture, shape, plane, space, volume, and form will be explored.
Syllabus????
Students learned about public art by helping to create public art with community artists for the Art+Fire Festival on the shores of Lake Pepin in Stockholm, Wisconsin.
Art - 2-D Design
Gudrun Lock
A series of two-dimensional projects through which the components of design are introduced and applied. Discussion includes the aesthetics and history of modern design, propaganda, and commericial advertising.
Students collaborated with a community group to design a 2-D project.
Biology - Immunology (Supported by Bonner CBR grant)
Devavani Chatterjea
The genetic and cellular basis of the immune response was explored through lectures, readings from primary and secondary literature, and discussions.
Click here for a PDF of the syllabus.
Students learned about the public dimensions of science by creating information sheets on chronic diseases for a local nonprofit.
Educational Studies - Experiences in Education
Tina Kruse
This course provides opportunities to explore, reflect upon and contribute to life in contemporary urban classrooms. A weekly seminar session, readings, reflective writing, and individual and small group projects complement the experiential aspects of the course.
Students interned at area schools while reflecting on the vocation of teaching.
Educational Studies - Education and Social Change
Ruthanne Kurth-Schai
Students considered contemporary barriers to and opportunities for systemic, progressive education reform and civic renewal on local, national and international levels.
Click here for a PDF of the syllabus.
Students worked both individually and collectively, on campus and in the community, to analyze specific social issues and reform strategies in addition to conceptualizing plans for principled social action.
Environmental Studies - Water and Power
Roopali Phadke
With a focus on large river basins, the course examines historical and emerging challenges to the equitable and sustainable use of transboundary waters.
Click here for PDF of syllabus.
Students conducted research at local organizations in order to compare local water policies with those abroad.
Environmental Studies - Environmental Leadership Practicum
Roopali Phadke
This course explored interdisciplinary approaches to environmental leadership by integrating a weekly seminar session and an intensive internship experience.
Click here for PDF of syllabus.
Students interned with an environmental organization or business (8-10 hours/week) in the Twin Cities metro region. Internships were pre-selected and student chose from a range of organizations.
Geography - Qualitative Methods in Geography
Daniel Trudeau
In this course, students learned to approach research as a process of knowledge construction and learn skills needed to contribute to the creation of credible knowledge, such as research design, ethics, data collection, analysis and authoritative writing.
Click here for PDF of syllabus.
Students worked at a local nonprofit or school to learn about the culture and mission of nonprofits.
Hispanic/Latino Studies – Locating US Latino Studies
(Supported by Bonner CBR grant)
Galo Gonzalez, Teresa Mesa
In this course, students studied the interdisciplinary field of contemporary U.S. Latino Studies that has emerged in response to this growing population. Students also learned to describe the main demographic features of the various U.S. Latino communities and compare each group's unique (im)migration history, settlement patterns, and transnational activities.
The class partnered with Centro, a nonprofit, to engage Latino issues.
Hispanic/Latino Studies - Introduction to the Analysis of Latino Texts
(Supported by Bonner CBR grant)
Teresa Mesa and Galo Gonzalez
This course presents the student with a basic tools for the systematic analysis of a broad range of topics and forms of cultural production (literature, cinema, art) in the Hispanic world.
Students completed an oral history project of Latino elders with Centro.
Humanities and Media and Cultural Studies - Media Institutions
Vincent Doyle
An analysis of the major forces that determine media production and distribution. Topics include the political economy of media, ownership and government regulation, system of power within media organization, and the influence of advertisers on news, media access, and diversity.
Students created projects that served a media need in the Twin Cities.
International Studies - Comparative Muslim Cultures
Smadar Lavie
The course introduces students to the diversity and heterogeneity of Muslim societies in the Arab World, Europe, Africa, North America, and South and South-East Asia. It traces Islam as a culturally lived experience, spanning from the local to the transnational.
Click here for a PDF file of the syllabus
The class completed ethnographies of local Muslim organizations and organized a Muslim summit for campus.
Psychology - Children Families, and Social Policy
Jennifer Wenner
In this course a developmental perspective was used in examining various issues regarding children, teens, and their families within society.
Students worked at area schools and nonprofits while learning about policy issues.
Sociology - Interpretive Social Science Research
Mahnaz Kousha
This class introduced students to the methodologies and analytic techniques of fieldwork and ethnography: participant observation, interviewing, and the use of documents.
Students had the option of completing a community service-learning or action-research project.
January 2008
Educational Studies - Thailand Seminar (Two week J-Term Seminar in Thailand)
Ruthanne Kurth-Schai
This seminar integrated varied ‘pedagogies of engagement’ (e.g. conversational reading, community-based teaching, group interview/seminar sessions, peer interaction) to connect Macalester students with Thai faculty, school and government officials, spiritual leaders, public intellectuals, and students from elementary through university levels to develop culturally grounded perspectives on national and local school-centered social reform.
Click here for a PDF file of the syllabus
Students engaged policy issues involving education in Thailand.
Spring 2008
American Studies - Schools and Prisons
Karin Aguilar San Juan
This course provides a real-world urban context for students who are deeply engaged in theorizing racism and other forms of structural inequalities in the U.S. It is based largely outside the classroom, draws on the College's relationships with the Twin Cities, and provides extensive opportunities for students to interact with community mentors.
Students are undertaking collaborative research projects with local criminal justice organizations.
Education - Experiences in Education
Marceline DuBose
This course provides opportunities to explore, reflect upon and contribute to life in contemporary urban classrooms. A weekly seminar session, readings, reflective writing, and individual and small group projects complement the experiential aspects of the course.
Students interned at area schools while reflecting on the vocation of teaching.
English - Introduction to Creative Writing
Stephen Healey
This course offers students introductory practice in three genres of creative writing: poetry, fiction, and creative nonfiction. Students will be required to submit at least three pieces of writing for each genre, and then revise some of this work for a final portfolio.
Class held a joint coffee hour with Minnesota Internship Center Charter School for students from both schools to share their writings.
Environmental Studies - Sustainable Development and the Global Future
(Supported by Bonner CBR Grant)
Roopali Phadke
This advanced course thoroughly examined the concept of sustainable development. The term was defined, its history examined and, and its political, philosophical, scientific, and economic significance was evaluated.
Click here for a PDF file of the syllabus
Students put learning into action by participating in micro lending initiatives within the Twin Cities.
Environmental Studies - Environmental Policy
Roopali Phadke
This course presents the elementary theories of environmental pollution (e.g., air, water and land pollution) and the economics of such global issues as climate change and biodiversity.
Click here for a PDF file of the syllabus
Students engaged in research around policy issues facing the Twin Cities.
Environmental Studies - Citizen Scientist, Environment, Technology, and Democracy
Roopali Phadke
This course explores the dynamic relationship between science, technology and society.
Click here for a PDF file of the syllabus
Students learned about the public dimensions of science by organizing public science conversations.
Environmental Studies - Environmental Studies Senior Seminar
Chris Wells
Through readings, discussions, guest speakers, field trips, independent research, writing, and oral presentations, students developed a clearer understanding of the underlying causes and long term implications of some of the environmental problems facing the world today.
Click here for a PDF file of the syllabus
Students researched environmental policies of Macalester as a member of the Twin Cities community.
Geography - Advanced Geography and Urban GIS *
(Supported by Project Pericles Grant)
Holly Barcus
Many neighborhood and community groups, local units of government, and research organizations have begun to implement Geographic Information Systems (GIS) in a wide range of tasks related to research, planning, and management in urban areas.
Click here for a PDF file of the syllabus
Geography - Urban Geography Field Seminar *
(Supported by Project Pericles Grant)
David Lanegran
A research method coure in which students will conduct an individual inquiry in one of the following subfields of urban geography: spatial structure of urban areas, spatial interaction; problems of economic localization; and factors in intra-urban residential mobility.
Students enrolled in this methods course conducted an individual inquiry into an issue facing the Twin Cities (e.g. foreclosure patterns).
Geography - Cities of the 21st Century *
(Supported by Project Pericles Grant)
Daniel Trudeau
In this urban studies capstone seminar students research the internal and external forces that will foster change and reinforce the status quo in American cities and urban society during the 21st century.
Click here for a PDF file of the syllabus
*Students in these three courses completed a publicly accessible atlas that will help local communities understand the environmental, economic, social, and cultural implications of metropolitan growth into rural areas.
Geography - Urban GIS
Laura Smith
This course allows students to participate in a "real world" application of their GIS knowledge and skills in a collaborative research project setting. Content of the course includes development of the research project, acquisition and utilization of data used in urban analysis, data manipulation, and analytical techniques unique to urban GIS.
Student researched spatial mismatches in the Twin Cities between jobs and employment.
Geography - Urban Social Geography
Daniel Trudeau
In this course, students explored some of the ways in which urban society is organized geographically.
Click here for a PDF file of the syllabus
Student completed oral history projects in collaboration with the Little Earth Indian community of Minneapolis.
Hispanic Studies - Hispanic Film and Other Media
Teresa Mesa
This course viewed feature films, documentaries, and other media from Spain, Latin America, and the U.S. from cultural, political, and linguistic perspectives.
Students had the option of completing community-based research projects in collaboration with local Latino organizations.
Humanities and Media and Cultural Studies - Video as Activist Medium
Jenny Lion
This class focused on overtly political possibilities of video-as intervention, propaganda, prank, advocacy technique, educational tool, act of witness, and legal or physical defense strategy.
Students created a video project in the community as a final project.
Humanities and Media and Cultural Studies - Experimental and Artists Video
Jenny Lion
This course integrated history, theory, and practice in a critical examination of experimental and artists’ video as an art form, political tool, and social process.
Students gained knowledge about documentary video and social change by partnering with Phillips Community Television.
Political Science - Presidential Elections
(Supported by Project Pericles Grant)
Julie Dolan
Student taught high school students about electoral politics.
Political Science - Legislative Politics
Julie Dolan
This course explored legislative politics through a combination of academic theory and focused field experiences.
Click here for a PDF of the syllabus.
Students worked in local government initiatives.
Political Science - Chuck Green Fellowship
Patrick Schmidt
Students with sophomore or junior standing may apply for this seven-month fellowship that includes a spring seminar and a full-time, fully-funded summer field experience.
Students gained skills in public engagement to prepare them for internships and collaborative research at area nonprofits over the summer.
Political Science - Race, Ethnicity, and Politics
(Supported by Bush Grant)
Paru Shah
Students analyzed racial and ethnic factors and their implications for political processes and public policy.
Click here for a PDF of the syllabus.
Students researched policy issues on behalf of four nonprofits in the Twin Cities.
Psychology - Distress, Disfunction, and Disorder
Jaine Strauss
This course examined the experiences, causes, and treatments of the major forms of distress and disorder codified in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM).
Students completed service-learning at area nonprofits to learn about the community dimensions of psychology.
Theatre and Dance - Oral History
Lara Nielsen
Students explored community-engaged theatre by creating performance based on oral histories and ethnographies with community members. |
