For more than a decade, community organizers, scholars, and practitioners have worked to leverage higher education courses and programs toward more just results at the intersection of civic and global learning. Two recent special issues in leading journals in civic and global education take stock of progress and possibilities in community-based global learning.
In the Michigan Journal of Community Service-Learning, co-editors Katie MacDonald (Athabasca University, Canada) and Jessica Vorstermans (York University, Canada) take the ruptures of the Black Lives Matter movement, COVID-19 pandemic, and mutual aid as starting points for re-imagining learning and movement as relational. In Frontiers: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Study Abroad, co-editors Samantha Brandauer (Dickinson College, USA), Teku Teku (Dickinson College in Cameroon, Cameroon), and Eric Hartman (Haverford College, USA) were inspired by articles from leaders and networks leveraging global education toward outcomes that transgress the limited colonial and unidirectional models that have been preeminent. These new voices both critique and revise who benefits from global and civic learning. They clarify the multiplicity and multidirectionality of relational knowledge creation and present new pathways for global education that support the co-creation of more just, inclusive, and sustainable communities.
Reading these two issues together brings into focus the extent to which civic, community, and global learning and diversity, equity, and inclusion work should be integrated to support one another. By aligning the civic and global learning aspirational goals and inherent challenges with which we all wrestle, we call in interdependence as an organizing principle. Through this lens of interdependence we see a profound shift in how we see ourselves – not merely as citizens of a given jurisdiction, but as full persons aiming to align our ideals, actions, and institutions with building more just relationships, connections, and partnerships. The Community-based Global Learning Collaborative, along with Frontiers and the Michigan Journal, invites you to take part in an interactive webinar on the state of community-based global learning, and the direction our work must continue to move.
Hear from three exemplar programs providing ten minute overviews of their articles, then engage in a conversation with authors and editors. Featured speakers include:
Mac Benavides and colleagues presenting, “Critical Commitments to Partnership in Global Service-Learning,” from the Michigan Journal
Nancy Erbstein and colleagues presenting, “Authentic Collaboration and Active Commitment to Equity: An Evolving Case of Centering Marginalized Voices in Education Abroad,” from Frontiers
Michael Wairungu, Matthew Carotenuto, and Njau Kibochi, presenting, “African Homestays and Community Engagement: A Case Study on Reciprocity and Neocolonialism,” from Frontiers
The conversation will be introduced and moderated by Samantha Brandauer and Richard Kiely, including an overview of the Michigan Journal intention introduction by Katie MacDonald and Jessica Vorstermans.