New UCI Fellowship Focuses on Building Community
What does it take to build community on a campus made up of diverse experiences, backgrounds and perspectives? A new cohort of undergraduate fellows is working together to find out.
The Practices in Community Building Fellowship, recently launched as part of the Undergraduate Community Initiative, comprises 25 students from the College, Columbia Engineering and Columbia General Studies, who will collaborate on projects that foster partnership and an understanding of the themes and ideas of the Core Curriculum.
More than 100 undergraduates applied for the fellowship, which kicked off with a series of getting-to-know-you meetings in the second half of the Fall semester. The diverse group includes Columbians whose lives have been affected by war and conflicts, from Israel to India to Northern Ireland, as well as veterans and a formerly incarcerated student — all of whom have creative ideas about how to bring people together.
“We tried to create a cohort of students who might have very different perspectives on some of the issues that have been tearing us apart over the last year,” says Larry Jackson, director of the Center for the Core Curriculum and a fellowship co-leader.
“If they’re working toward some kind of common good, it can build a bridge that allows for productive disagreement.”
A variety of projects will emerge from the students’ work together. For example, fellows may opt to develop a lecture series focused on service, undertake projects in oral history or storytelling, or build community through the arts. The team has been clustered into smaller groups based on their areas of interest; in cohort meetings this fall, they heard from guest speakers from The Trust Collaboratory and Community Impact.
Jackson is guiding the fellowship alongside Jonathon S. Kahn GSAS’03, a professor of religion at Vassar who has experience developing student team-project programs. Kahn says he is already excited by the energy the fellows are bringing to the table. “When they are in the room together, their desire to talk, to share and to listen is palpable,” he says. “They are thirsty to engage each other. They are almost relieved to find themselves in a setting where they can speak their mind while also cultivating space for their peers to do the same. It’s really been interesting to watch how norms of mutual respect and mutual care continue to emerge implicitly through their interactions.”
Beginning in January, students will spend time on other community projects on campus (say, volunteering with a local soup kitchen or other organization), and take a one-credit course, “Practices in Community Building,” in which they can reflect on the work they’re doing and what they’re learning from it. There will also be assigned readings that tie to the Core, and group conversations about their varied experiences with the curriculum.
The second half of the Spring semester will focus students on developing and leading their own projects and experiments in community building. Kahn notes that a critical part of the fellowship is the experience of working closely together. “The way ideas begin to take form through genuine cooperation is vital, allowing the fellows to create something that expands their own sense of what is possible,” he says. “I’m very much looking forward to seeing how those partnerships yield creative fruit.”