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Our Mission

The mission of our program is to strengthen the assets and support the needs of our community partners in the Greater Baltimore region. Our students will develop inclusive and restorative mindsets through community engaged service and dynamic reflection.

Our Vision

Our program will launch proactive, participatory, and curious life-long learners who build authentic relationships and amplify community voices.

What is Community Engaged Learning?

Community gives explicit reference to campus-community partnerships and collaborations that extend beyond the classroom and create bridges beyond the borders of the campus itself.

Engagement involves ethical relationships that bridge in both directions, leading to mutually beneficial and impactful processes and outcomes.

Learning further specifies that our community engagement centers around educational activities with integrated curricular and broader co-curricular and lifelong learning goals.

Community engaged learning in our usage thus overlaps and complements other forms of community engagement on and off campus including, for example, community engaged scholarship, community engaged teaching, and community engaged research, creating natural bridges and connections between community engagement activities in Shriver Center’s direct student programming and scholarly activities of our faculty and staff, and community engagement activities across our UMBC colleges and peer Centers. CEL at Shriver Center also reflects and affirms the values and practices embedded in Shriver Center’s Mission and Vision, Partnership framework and Truth Racial Healing and Transformation statement.

What We Do

Curriculum

  • We teach Practicum 096: Community Engaged Learning, a 0-credit, Pass/Fail course.
  • Pair UMBC students with a community partner for regular service over a semester.
  • Reflective assignments teach students about systemic inequality, power, & privilege.
  • 90% of students report an increase in workforce readiness skills like intercultural communication; leadership; and confidence.
  • We partner with multiple for-credit courses at UMBC, reinforcing existing coursework with hands-on experience.

The Shriver Living Learning Community

  • An intentional community of first-year students with a vested dedication and interest in building community power through service.
  • Open to first-year students of any major, (transfer or freshman), with up to 24 beds available each academic year.
  • Cohort building through a shared academic experience, where students take UNIV 101 together in the Fall, and Sociology 396 in the Spring.
  • A dedicated Peer Mentor program to support first-year students acclimate to college.

Student Leader Program

  • Student workforce of passionate, dedicated alum of PRAC 096.
  • Recruit, train, and transport volunteers/PRAC 096 students to community partner sites.
  • Support both the mission of the Community Engaged Learning team & their community partner.
  • Co-design and execute wide-scale group reflection sessions.

Scholarship

In partnership with the Office of Institutional Advancement, The Shriver Center is involved with the recruitment, selection, and support of several scholarships for UMBC students dedicated to community engagement while at UMBC.

  • France-Merrick Scholarship Program (open only to Peer Mentors of SLLC).

  • Samuel I. Rosenberg Fund Award. 

  • The Samson, Rosetta A., and Sadie Feldman Award.