NASPA – Student Affairs Administrators in Higher Education recently announced the members of the Lead Initiative on Civic Learning and Democratic Engagement (Lead Initiative), which recognizes and supports a network of 73 colleges and universities with strong commitments to civic learning and democratic engagement. Selected institutions, representing public and private four-year and two-year colleges and universities, have committed to a series of strategies to make civic learning and democratic engagement an integrated and core component of the division of Student Affairs through planning, partnerships, and assessment.
The goals of the program are:
- Building clear and tangible civic learning and democratic engagement activities into student affairs division strategic goals and learning outcomes.
- Creating strategies in collaboration with students, faculty, and community partners that increase civic learning and help solve community problems through collective action.
- Collecting and reporting data on the efficacy of campus efforts using tools that measure gains in civic learning and democratic engagement.
Three North Carolina institutions – Davidson College, UNC Greensboro, and Wake Forest University – were named among the 73 nationwide. They are all members of North Carolina Campus Compact.
To learn more about NASPA’s Lead Initiative, please visit the NASPA website at: http://www.naspa.org/clde/lead_initiative.cfm.