Report celebrates “culture shift” and expansion of community engagement
McMaster’s Office of Community Engagement has released its first annual report outlining a host of new partnerships and initiatives that are connecting and engaging hundreds of members of the McMaster and Hamilton communities.
The report describes the expansion of community-based activities at McMaster in recent years and focuses on the many research, education and service initiatives developed or facilitated by the Office in collaboration with a growing network of campus and community partners.
Key initiatives include the development and launch of a foundations course in community engagement, an interdisciplinary minor in community engagement, the Leadership in Community Engagement Certificate offered by McMaster’s Centre for Continuing Education, and catalyst grants to support a range of community-engaged projects.
The Office has also worked in collaboration with community partners on a number of significant initiatives including Change Camp Hamilton and the Research Shop – a service that connects community organizations with McMaster graduate student research expertise – as well as the recently launched CityLab, a new collaborative program in which students from McMaster, Mohawk College and Redeemer University College are teaming up with the City of Hamilton to tackle real-world challenges.
Also highlighted in the report, are the ways in which the Office is actively working to coordinate community engagement activities across campus and enhance connections with community partners through a number of vehicles including the Network for Community Campus Partnerships (NCCP) – formed in response to President Patrick Deane’s open letter, Forward with Integrity – community-campus working groups, and through involvement in regional, national and global networks to share lessons learned and best practices.
Another significant milestone captured in the report is the Office’s 2016-2021 strategic plan, developed after extensive consultation with over 300 faculty, staff and community members. The plan established six key principles of community engagement and identified goals intended to guide the development of community partnerships and community-engaged initiatives at McMaster.
“Since President Deane penned Forward with Integrity in 2011, there has been and expansion of community-based research, education and service activities across campus,” says McMaster’s Director of Community Engagement, Sheila Sammon.
“Our office has been in a unique position to observe a shift in campus culture toward many more coordinated and principled community engagement activities,” she says. “It has been a privilege to be part of the development of new projects, to provide opportunities for capacity building among students, staff and faculty and to work closely with community partners on initiatives that contribute to the social good.”
