The Research University Civic Engagement Network (TRUCEN) works to advance civic engagement and engaged scholarship among research universities and to create resources and models for use across higher education. TRUCEN calls upon research university colleagues to embrace a bold vision for civic and community engagement and work to bring it about.
As secretariat for the network, Campus Compact serves as a convener and as a disseminator of information and resources. See below for information about TRUCEN and its work, including links to two seminal reports and a new online toolkit.
Mobilizing Research Universities
In recent years, increasing numbers of colleges and universities have engaged in innovative efforts to engage their surrounding communities. Recognizing research universities’ potential to provide leadership in this effort, in the fall of 2005 Campus Compact and the Jonathan M. Tisch College of Citizenship and Public Service at Tufts University convened scholars from some of the many research universities that have undertaken ambitious community efforts to discuss how their institutions are promoting engagement on their campuses and in their communities.
The group not only shared their ideas; they decided to take action by taking on a more visible leadership role in the civic engagement movement. As a first expression of that role, they developed a case statement that outlines why it is important for research universities to embrace and advance engaged scholarship as a central component of their activities and programs at every level — institutional, faculty, and student.
Landmark Resources: Reports and Models
The statement, endorsed by the entire group, argues that research universities’ exceptional faculty, students, financial resources, and research facilities position them to contribute to community change relatively quickly and in ways that will ensure deeper and longer-lasting commitment to civic engagement across higher education. The group’s rationale and recommendations are contained in its first report, New Times Demand New Scholarship: Research Universities and Civic Engagement — A Leadership Agenda, published by Tufts University in 2006.
In 2007 the group expanded, creating a research universities and civic engagement network, and convened for a second meeting at the University of California, Los Angeles, to further the conversation.
The network’s second report, New Times Demand New Scholarship II: Research Universities and Civic Engagement — Opportunities and Challenges, focuses on four critical areas: 1) engaged scholarship, 2) scholarship focused on civic and community engagement, 3) educating students for civic and community engagement, and 4) advancing civic engagement within and across research universities. This second report also includes models from a range of participating research universities.
In 2008 the group convened at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, to focus on civic and community-engaged scholarship. At the meeting, the group agreed to organize itself formally as TRUCEN and open its membership to all Carnegie Foundation-defined “very high research institutions” that share its goals.
Meeting participants reviewed efforts to strengthen institutional rewards and incentives for engaged scholarship, to identify special challenges and opportunities presented by research universities, and to explore constructive steps to encourage engaged scholarship across research universities. The group also initiated design of a major online resource for advancing this work.
Developed by Timothy K. Stanton of Stanford University and Jeffrey P. Howard of the University of Michigan with assistance from a broad network of contributors, this online resource—The Research University Engaged Scholarship Toolkit—offers an annotated guide to the best information available on engaged scholarship, as well as models, exemplars, and original essays.
Ongoing TRUCEN meetings will continue to explore ways to advance civic and community engagement among research universities and other institutions of higher education and to generate additional models and resources to support this effort.
Contact Dr. Timothy Stanton for more information or to provide feedback.
