State Farm Faculty Fellows 2007-2008
Illinois Campus Compact – composed of member higher education institutions, will provide professional development opportunity mini-grants for faculty members to collaborate with area P-12 schools to integrate community engagement into their teaching, research, and professional service.

2007-2008 Faculty Fellows

Kathy Guthrie
Clinical Instructor and Coordinator of Service-Learning
University of Illinois at Springfield
One University Plaza, MS BRK 482
Springfield, IL 62703

Abstract: Abraham Lincoln is known as one of the great leaders in American history. In 2008-2009, the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum, along with the University of Illinois at Springfield and many other state-wide entities, will be celebrating the bicentennial of Abraham Lincoln’s birth. This project will bring university service-learning students, P-12 youth from surrounding areas and community members together to learn and celebrate this great man. Service-Learning participants from University of Illinois at Springfield will develop and lead service projects with P-12 students from surrounding areas that relate to the legacy of Lincoln.

Alannah Ari Hernandez
Director of Academic Service-Learning and Spanish Professor
Concordia University Chicago
7400 Augusta Street, W.A. 122
River Forest, IL 60305

“For the Love of Reading Program”: A Partnership Program between Concordia University Chicago and Melrose Park Elementary School of District 89
Abstract: The Academic Service Learning Center at Concordia University Chicago, in River Forest, is in the process of developing a program called “For the Love of Reading”. This program is intended to work with children in the nearby school district who scored below state level in the reading segment of the Illinois Standards Achievement Test (ISAT). The “For the Love of Reading Program” will endeavor to develop reading appreciation as well as language development and vocabulary acquisition. The program will consist of Concordia University students who will go to the partner school chosen to be our pilot school and will read fun and interesting books –out loud—to children who have been identified by the school as having “limited English proficiency”. The children will be read to, and will also be exposed to new vocabulary which will show up in the texts. After the reading sessions are over, the children will have follow up activities in which they can reinforce the content of the material that was read to them, as well as the new vocabulary presented. One major requirement for the follow-up activities is that they must be fun. This program wants to make the children aware of the pleasurable aspect of reading, with the hope of developing positive attitudes that will lead the children towards becoming life-long readers, as well as improving their linguistic production. The long term goal of this program is to help with the expansion of the children’s vocabulary, for, as those of us in education know: language is power; and that is what we intend to do, to empower the future of our nation by planting the seeds of language and knowledge today.

Diane Schiller
Professor of Education
Loyola University Chicago
6525 North Sheridan Road
Chicago, IL 60626

The Power of Two
(Math + Theater) + (Pre-service Teachers + Seventh Graders)

Abstract: the Power of Two project combines two seemingly different content areas-- math and theater arts. While math is universally acknowledged as a proper content area for elementary school study, theater arts is rarely part of the urban school curriculum. The Power of Two will allow three teacher preparation faculty at Loyola University Chicago and three 7th grade teachers at Swift School to collaborate to provide a service learning opportunity for their students while integrating mathematics and theater arts. This project is expected to impact 78 Swift + 52 Loyola students + 6 faculty + Lifeline Theater.

Elaine Sharpe
Assistant Professor
Rockford College
5050 East State Street
Rockford, IL 61108

Project Citizen
Abstract: Civic Engagement is not accidental. Youth must be invited to embrace their civic responsibility while being trained with the necessary skills to become change agents. This side-by-side service learning project utilizes college mentors assisting in the implementation of Project Citizen and lobbying training for seventh and eighth grade students. These student partners will work jointly to identify a local, state or national issue that they will ultimately take to Springfield to lobby with their legislators. Additionally, the college students will gain insight into the cognitive processes of adolescents, strengthen their leadership skills and deepen their own sense of civic responsibility.

2005-2006 Faculty Fellows

Dr. Masoud Moallem, Rockford College
In this service learning project that will be implemented in my economic classes, the students will tutor grade and middle school pupils on their reading deficiencies using economic and business related books. This project mainly intends to mitigate the reading deficiency of grade and middle school students while teaching the pupils the concepts related to money, credit, income, banking, loans, and government. Furthermore, my students’ comprehension will improve as they try to master the concepts related to their course work in order to explain them in very simple language to school pupils.

Dr. Tom McIntyre, Rockford College
Dr. Thomas McIntyre, Associate Professor of Anthropology and Sociology, in collaboration with Mike Cannariato, Roosevelt High School, Great Lakes Peace Jam, the Jane Addams Center for Civic Engagement, students from Rockford College and students from several area high schools will come together to form a Rockford Area Peace Jam Affiliate. Peace Jam is a year-round international education program built around thirteen Nobel Peace Laureates who work personally with youth to pass on the spirit, skills and wisdom they embody. The goal of Peach Jam is to inspire a new generation of peacemakers who will transform their local communities local communities, themselves, and the world through dialogue and service. The program includes a powerful non-violence curriculum that focuses on one of the thirteen Nobel Peace Prize winners each year. High school-aged participants study the curriculum with the help of college student mentors, have the opportunity to meet and interact with the participating Nobel Laureate at the annual youth conference, and complete a relevant service project in their community.

Dr. Patti Powell, Trinity Christian College
Four years ago a group of SPED 111, Sign Language I, Trinity Christian College students traveled to the Caribbean Christian Center for the Deaf, (CCCD) in Montego Bay, Jamaica, to work on a one week service-learning project during their January Interim. The trip broadened their sign language skills, exposed them to both Jamaican culture and Deaf culture and allowed them to work on the school’s facilities. During the fall of 2003 and 2004, these students additionally developed lesson plans for the CCCD students and teachers. Next January, 2006, the Trinity team plans on expanding its outreach in Jamaica by inviting all 50 teachers from the four CCCD campuses to work with us, sharing our time, lessons and lives.

Beth Hatt-Echeverria, Illinois State University
To meet the increasing needs of Latino children and English Language Learners in schools, this project focuses upon improving the competency of educational professionals working with these students. The project entails undergraduate and graduate students seeking degrees in education being placed in a service learning capacity to live in Michoacan, Mexico for four weeks during the summer. The program will allow students to learn ore about service learning, Mexican culture; develop Spanish language skills, and awareness of critical issues facing `Mexican families in the United States. Students will experience unique learning opportunities through working in Mexican schools, homes and community centers.

Rita L. Bailey, Illinois State University
Department of Speech Pathology and Audiology, Illinois State University A service-learning project for students enrolled in PAS 449 (Dysphagia ) will encourage mealtime social communication between students with and without disabilities. Students will provide individual and group training to students with and without disabilities in communication strategies to enhance spontaneous use of augmentative and alternative (AAC) devices and systems at the mealtime. An additional goal includes increasing inclusion opportunities for students with disabilities in an integrated high school lunchroom. Documentation of the results of these interventions will be documented and results analyzed. A follow-up probe will be conducted the following semester to determine generalization of project results.

Dr. Ann M. Feldman, University of Illinois Chicago
Thirty University of Illinois at Chicago first-year writing students will come to understand writing as a vehicle for community engagement and service. Students will learn to analyze the rhetorical aspects of community situations requiring written intervention and operationalize their analyses in their writing analyses in their writing. Providing context for this learning will be two not-for-profit organizations serving young people and/or their school teachers, Gads Hill Center and Changing Worlds. Agency staff will collaborate with UIC instructors and students to devise writing-related projects that advance the agencies’ missions while providing both UIC students and the agencies’ young service consumers opportunities to learn and serve.

Ellen McManus, Dominican University
Dominican University students enrolled in a sophomore seminar called Imagining the Other will work with San Miguel middle school students enrolled in an eight-week after-school class called Web Page Design. The Dominican students will help the San Miguel students create personal web pages, encouraging them to use the pages to express themselves creatively; describe themselves, family, friends, and interests; and present artwork, writing, and other accomplishments. The San Miguel students will gain computer skills, learn a new form of self-expression, and have the opportunity to interact with interested college students. The Dominican students will have the opportunity to provide service and to explore what it means to enter imaginatively into the life of another. (This project is currently being carried out, and this proposal is for funding to repeat the project in the spring of 2006).