The Center for Liberal Education and Civic Engagement

Founded in 2003, the Center for Liberal Education and Civic Engagement seeks to deepen understandings of the relation of liberal education and civic engagement to the heart of a student's academic learning.

It aims to do this through partnerships and projects such as the Council of Europe, The Democracy Imperative, and Film Your Issue.

The Center is the result of a partnership between AAC&U, the nation's leading advocate and voice for liberal education, and Campus Compact, the nationally known organization promoting service learning.

Current Partnerships and Activities

Elon University Research Seminar on Engaged Undergraduate Learning

Elon University and AAC&U are co-sponsoring a national, two-year multidisciplinary seminar for college faculty and staff to facilitate the development of innovative research and pedagogy on issues central to engaged undergraduate learning. The inaugural seminar will focus on teaching democratic thinking.

Elizabeth Minnich, senior scholar at AAC&U, will serve as the intellectual anchor for the seminar. As a group, seminar participants will explore the existing literature and conduct research on how students come to learn and to develop democratic thinking habits, how to teach for democratic thinking, and how best to assess and document democratic thinking processes. Seminar participants also will develop and conduct research projects at their home institutions to investigate how students learn to think democratically.

Applications and more information for the 2009-2011 seminar may be accessed at http://org.elon.edu/ers/. To be given full consideration, applications must be received by April 1, 2009. Questions about the seminar should be addressed to ers@elon.edu.

Civic Engagement at the Center

Informed by the work of the Bonner Foundation, Civic Engagement at the Center: Building Democracy through Integrated Cocurricular and Curricular Experiences, highlights developmental models for students’ civic learning and socially responsible leadership implemented at 77 campuses. The monograph describes key elements of the co-curricular model, research on its impact on students, and emerging civic engagement minors created to complement decades of work in student affairs.

Council of Europe Project on Democratic Citizenship

AAC&U welcomes member institutions to join in an ongoing transnational project with the Council of Europe to define ways colleges and universities can more effectively foster student learning about democratic cultures and human rights, while also enhancing students’ capacities and commitments to be civically engaged in multicultural and divided societies. 

The Center for Liberal Education and Civic Engagement encourages colleges and universities to sign on to the Declaration of Principles affirmed at the June 2006 transatlantic forum at the Council of Europe and share campus practices and programs anticipated and in place at your institution.

Visit the Council of Europe website to become part of this dynamic international network of institutions committed to educating for democracy, human rights, and citizenship.

The Democracy Imperative

The Democracy Imperative at the University of New Hampshire is a new community of practice and national network of multidisciplinary scholars, campus leaders and civic leaders in the fields of democracy building, public deliberation, democratic dialogue, and social change.

They state that "nearly all colleges and universities claim to "educate citizens" or to promote civic engagement. And nearly all colleges and universities care about diversity as both a matter of access and equity and as a matter of educational quality. By promoting deliberative democracy on campus, campuses can reinvigorate their diversity and civic education/engagement commitments."

The Democracy Imprerative and the Deliberative Democracy Consortium are hosting a national conference, "No Better Time: Promosing Opportunities in Deliberative Democracy for Educators and Practitioners" at the University of New Hampshire from July 8-11, 2009.

For more information, please visit The Democracy Imperative or contact the Acting Director, Nancy Thomas.

Film Your Issue

The Association of American Colleges and Universities is proud to continue its partnership with Film Your Issue, an ambitious outreach to young Americans to engage them in the public dialogue about pressing issues of importance to them.

We join FYI in inviting young people to express themselves through short videos, essays and docu-photography which demonstrates the power of democracy and also shows that engagement lies with those that speak up and have a voice. We encourage all college students to participate and submit their own issue.

Details on the 2008 competition can be found at Film Your Issue.

If you have questions about the contest, please direct them to HeathCliff Rothman, founder and President of Film Your Issue.

Past Projects and Partnerships

Journey Towards Democracy

In the Spring 2003, the Center for Liberal Education and Civic Engagement released a call for proposals for a national dialogue project, Journey Towards Democracy: Power, Voice, and the Public Good.

It invited colleges and universities to sponsor robust and candid dialogues about how to put student learning about democracy and the public good at the center of academic inquiry. The dialogues offered a means through which campuses could a gain deeper institutional understanding about how to educate students for democracy, how liberal education could foster civic engagement, what stood in the way of these efforts, and what new directions institutions might take in making civic learning a core component of every student's education.

American Commitments: Diversity, Democracy, and Liberal Learning

American Commitments was a multi-project initiative that focuses on the connections between societal diversity and democratic aspirations. Begun in 1993 and ending in 2001, the initiative provided resources to help colleges and universities address diversity in their mission, campus community, and educational programs.

American Commitments linked a national network of colleges and universities seeking to increase diversity on their campuses and in their curricula and to make diversity a positive educational resource.

The American Commitments initiative supported faculty learning about cultural diversity in the United States and helped campuses to change their curricula to reflect American cultural and democratic pluralism.

A primary goal was to graduate students who were prepared and inspired to contribute to the success of a just and diverse democracy.