In Hartford, the Community Learning Partnership and its local partners have created a unique two-year degree program in Community Change Studies. As with the Partnership’s other educational initiatives, we have created this educational pathway in response to the crisis in the supply of highly skilled community organizers and other community change agents. The local partners are Capital Community College, local community organizations, other nonprofits, the City of Hartford’s Office of Youth Services, Americorps VISTA and private foundations.
The Connecticut Pipeline Initiative is designed specifically to recruit and develop a new generation of organizers, particularly people of color and others from low-income and working class backgrounds. The Pipeline Initiative offers an Associate in Arts degree in Community Change Studies through Capital Community College. This practitioner education program is a hybrid, having been designed collaboratively by faculty at the College and organizers and trainers from the nonprofit sector to provide an entirely new educational pathway into organizing. It combines reading and classroom study with experiential education in neighborhoods, giving participants learning opportunities to master the skills as well as the theory which sophisticated organizers and leaders need to make great gains in the struggle for substantial social and community change.
The market for graduates of such a program is substantial. Organizers with outstanding skills and broad knowledge are desperately needed by community groups which are involved in service delivery, educational reform, neighborhood planning and community development as well as “organizing” groups. They are also needed by other nonprofits and public agencies which are committed to involving youth, parents, or community residents in planning and action projects.
There are four routes into the AA degree program. Many participants were already enrolled as students at Capital and drawn to this opportunity to prepare for long-term careers in community change. A second group is being identified through aggressive, targeted recruitment of young people, community leaders, and new staff of local groups to enter the AA program, We are building recruitment systems through community groups and nonprofits and through “spotters” who are particularly good at spotting the kinds of young and community people who might be ideal for community change careers, especially people of color and people with working class and low-income backgrounds.
Our third route is through High Schools. We offered a pilot month-long summer High School course in organizing and community change last year and plan to expand it to other schools in 2009, using these programs to interest young people in pursuing an AA degree in Community Change at Capital. Fourth, we are creating special training and internship programs which are outside college walls but which provide college credit. In the summer of 2008, for example, we provided a full month of intense training by experienced organizers to people from the community, including youth who received City youth employment income during their training. We currently have several VISTAs and other young people undergoing intensive training and experience in participatory research and community organizing. Their training will broaden to include opportunities to develop skills and knowledge in research, power analysis, team work, issue and leadership development, and understanding the local economy, local and state government, and social trends. They will work on a local campaign as an integral part of their learning. And VISTA will award education grants of $4725 to everyone who completes their year of service.
Another unique feature -- College credit will be offered by Capital Community College to everyone who completes the training and chooses to create a portolio to earn college credit for the work they accomplished during their year-long training. These features are obviously particularly important for people with limited incomes who might otherwise not have an opportunity to go to college.
Building on this partnership, Capital Community College has created a degree option program in Community Change Studies. The first cohort of students is enrolled in the program, and we currently are working with faculty and college leaders to refine at least six existing courses and then to develop additional courses. The degree is open to any regular enrollee seeking a two-year Associate’s degree at Capital, as well as to people who have earned college credit outside college walls through our Training and Apprenticeship track.
Those who complete our special programs will start the in-college phase of their education having already completed the equivalent of 2 college courses, perhaps 3. That plus the VISTA education grant and their likely eligibility for Pell education grants will give them a strong start toward the AA degree in Community Change Studies. It will also make it considerably easier for them to combine completion of their degree with paid work in organizing or other community-serving positions where their new knowledge and experience will be applied and refined.
For those wanting to continue their education beyond an AA, Charter Oak and other state universities will accept all the credits earned through this combination of experiential and classroom education. We will be working with Charter Oak State College and our other partners to fashion a four year Bachelors in Community Change Studies.
The BA curriculum would build on the AA and offer courses on key social, economic, and public policy issue areas as well as advanced courses in organizing and coalition-building strategies, group dynamics and facilitation, participatory and community research, urban and state policy analysis and reform, and related issues. It would offer opportunities to develop skills ranging from those needed to catalyze collective action and build sustainable organizations, to strategic thinking, research and analysis. The BA program would include courses which enable students to develop in depth knowledge of the particular issue s/he may be addressing (e.g. housing, or jobs and economic development) and an understanding of the institutions, policies, and actors. Integrated into the courses would be exposure to alternative strategies which groups elsewhere have found effective in bringing about positive change on those issues.
The BA program would, of course, provide a base for postgraduate education for those wishing to proceed further. At a later time we hope to work with others in either creating a new MA in Community Change Studies or refining an existing MA program so it fully meets the special educational needs of community organizers and change agents, including the midcareer education needs of experienced organizers who would benefit greatly from peer learning and interaction, an opportunity to deepen their understanding of theory and experience elsewhere, and for in depth study of the issues they are tackling, and the education they need as they take on greater leadership and management responsibilities.
In devising this entire pathway, we are giving long-overdue recognition to a central fact. Community change work requires that people develop both an extraordinarily wide range of practical skills and an increasingly sophisticated mastery of many areas of knowledge. The shortage of people with the skills and breadth of knowledge needed to organize people into effective action on increasingly significant issues is acute. Its effects are often crippling for community groups of all kinds – those which focus on community service delivery and community development as well as community organizing. And it is unrealistic to expect underfunded nonprofits to develop a pipeline of talent for key positions without partnerships with the educational institutions which have far greater access to resources, students, and other assets than nonprofits do.
To respond to the unique educational needs of community organizers and other change agents, community groups, coalitions and other practitioners must play a very strong role in partnering with academic institutions. What is needed is practitioner education, what doctors or lawyers call “clinical education.” That requires involvement of a healthy mix of practitioners and faculty members lest it be either too “academic” or too narrowly focused on mechanics and “hard skills.”
It is essential that steps be taken to ensure that people with great potential to play these vital community change roles have opportunities to –
- learn that they can have careers in community organizing and community change; this vital field of work is currently completely invisible on college campuses; and
- develop the skills and knowledge they need to pursue community change careers, rather than facing the current dilemma – whatever major they choose, it will divert them from learning what they need to know to be effective change agents on the massive social, economic, and political issues facing our nation, including the growing gap between rich and poor, the decline in urban neighborhoods and rural communities, and the weakening of democracy and democratic practice.
This new AA degree option program is the first two year program in the nation to focus on training community organizers. This breakthrough is already stirring interest in several other cities across the US. It is highly likely that current discussions with Charter Oak State College will result in a partnership offering two additional years of Community Change Studies courses, enabling students to earn a four year BA degree specializing in community organizing and change. This too will set a national precedent.
Sequence of Steps in this Educational Pathway
For further information contact Andy Mott or Soyun Park at (202) 822-6006, or at andymott@communitylearningproject.org or soyun@communitylearningproject.org
