Many universities that engage in community development issues do so with a heavy emphasis on research. As a result, faculty and staff at DePaul, a teaching university in Chicago, view their work with the West Humboldt Park community as a test case. Focusing on teaching, faculty have engaged their students in a host of service-learning projects that help residents build the skills for community development. Examples include a legal clinic through which students have helped residents reclaim abandoned properties and push drug dealers out of their neighborhood, and business class projects in which students offer recommendations for economic development in the business district.
From Service Matters 1998: Engaging Higher Education In the Renewal of America s Communities and American Democracy
Web site: http://ccts2.cti.depaul.edu/whpdc/index.htm
Contact: William Howard, Executive Director, williamhoward {at} aol(.)com
