SL/CE Menu: SL, SE, CE

Wanting to celebrate and track the breadth of community-connected offerings we provide at Upstate, the Office of Service Learning and Community Engagement has developed three distinct designations for courses that stand out with regard to our community.* We want to track SL/CE activity to reward faculty who invest in this important pedagogy and to demonstrate that SL/CE has impacts at Upstate similar to those reported an many other institutions. An overview of each of our official designations appears below.

Service Learning
15-25 hours of service to the community where the service is integral to student learning – roughly equivalent to the textbook and class discussion. Students should engage in collaborative and guided reflection over the course of the semester, as they tie their service to core course content. They should also overtly consider two SL/CE SLOs (the same NACE career competencies addressed in our QEP) as a part of their learning experience.

Service Engagement
4-14 hours of service to the community where the service supplements and reinforces learning as a rough equivalent to homework and ties this engagement to core course content. Reflection and attention to one SL/CE SLO should contribute to their learning experience.

Community Engagement
4+ hours of active engagement in the community that supplements and reinforces learning without a service component. As with SE, reflection and attention to one SL/CE SLO should contribute to their learning experience.

For more information visit our SL/CE Course Designation page and/or email Dave to get a personalized template for your application.

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*while we primarily focus on our local region, we define community in the broadest sense, from our geographic neighbors to anywhere on the planet, even the air above it.