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Intersections/Perspectives
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Urban Faculty Seminar Program Overview In Minneapolis and St. Paul, civic engagement cannot be separated from multiculturalism. With 42% of the residents identifying with at least on minority group and recent immigrants comprising 15% of residents, the Twin Cities offer extraordinary opportunities to gain knowledge and skill about diverse cultures and communities. Opportunities to engage the rich array of cultures in the Twin Cities will help faculty become more effective teachers and advisers across social difference. Deeper social knowledge about inter-group and intra-group relations locally and, by extension, in the United States, counteracts the well-documented fact that European-Americans live and work in more segregated environments than other Americans. Such knowledge also erodes the social, psychological, institutional and physical barriers that restrict what we know about the lives of those who do not share our ethnic/racial identification. We propose an urban immersion seminar for faculty as a way of moving through these barriers and connecting to community members and leaders from widely disparate cultural backgrounds. Multiculturalism and civic engagement have been central to Macalester's mission for over 40 years. Macalester's exceptional Community Service Office connects 80% of our students to volunteer opportunities in the community before they graduate. In any given year, half of the student body engages in community service. While we are proud and supportive of this valuable work, we know that too many Macalester faculty members regard civic engagement solely as an extra-curricular activity for students. This premise persists despite several excellent Macalester courses that include service learning components. The Urban Faculty Seminar will cultivate a larger group of faculty who understand the role our urban environment can play in academic programs. This role is vital is students are to test and modify abstract theories in the messy, dynamic, increasingly multicultural communities across the nation and around the world. Candidates for the Urban Faculty Seminar will include those that are well acquainted with the community, but have never considered a civic engagement component to their courses. The Urban Faculty Seminar will:
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