This two-day, in-person institute at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice will introduce faculty and staff to an experiential learning approach for incorporating social action campaigns into either a semester-long course or co-curricular workshop series. In this transformative experiential learning model, students develop and launch a social action campaign of their choosing during the semester the course is taught.
The student campaigns seek to change a rule, regulation, norm, or practice of an institution, whether on campus or in the community. While not all of the student campaigns are successful, many have been and those that haven’t succeeded have still taught valuable lessons to those who led them and those who were engaged in one form or another.
Note: we ask that attendees fully participate in our community of practice by making the following commitments.
Institute Participants
Hosts
Chevy Alford
Associate Professor
Percy Ellis Sutton SEEK (Opportunity) Program
John Jay College of Criminal Justice
Read profile here.
Chevy’s Social Action Course — Education for Social Change in the United States
Tracie Meyers
Assistant Professor
John Jay College of Criminal Justice
Read LinkedIn profile here.
Tracie’s Social Action Course — Education and Justice
Adele Newson-Horst
Morgan State University
English and Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies
Adrian Bordoni
Queens Borough Community College
Social Sciences
Ashton Brice
Morgan State University
English and Language Arts
Chad Kidd
The City College of New York (CUNY)
Philosophy
Elycia Daniel
Clark Atlanta University
Sociology and Criminal Justice
Erika Pichardo
Sacred Heart University
Sociology, Criminology, and Criminal Justice
Gloria Browne-Marshall
John Jay College
LPS
Haisu Huang
Stony Brook University
Sociology
Jasmine Claude
York College, CUNY
World Languages, Literatures, and Humanities
Karen Altendorf
Bucknell University
Sociology and Anthropology
LaDawn Haglund
John Jay College
Political Science
Marie Lily Cerat
Brooklyn College
Dept. of Global Languages, Literatures, and Cultures & CUNY Haitian Studies Institute
Mehrunnisa Wani
York College
English/Journalism
Rahbel Rahman-Tahir
Graduate School of Social Service - Fordham University
Graduate School of Social Service
Rahul Pathak
Baruch College, City University of New York
Marxe School of Public and International Affairs
Sarah Wolf
Brooklyn College, CUNY
Health and Nutrition Sciences
Tailisha Gonzalez
Lehman College
Health, Administration, Research, and Technology
Theodore Andrews
Medgar Evers College
Social and Behavioral Sciences
Tia Malkin-Fontecchio
West Chester University of Pennsylvania
History
Tracy Webber
University of Rochester Medical Center
Obstetrics and Gynecology
Virginia Diaz-Mendoza
John Jay College of Criminal Justice
SEEK Department
Walter Rodríguez
Lehman College
Health, Administration, Research and Technology
Institute Agenda
Institute Preparation
During the two-day Institute, participants will begin to develop a teaching plan to support student campaigns to be launched mid-semester. The Institute sessions will be led by Dr. Scott Myers-Lipton, Professor Emeritus of Sociology at San José State University. In preparation for the Institute, participants will read two textbooks — CHANGE! A Student Guide to Social Action and CHANGE! A Guide to Teaching Social Action — as well as CHANGE! A Companion Guide to Teaching Social Action.
These resources address all aspects of teaching a social action course, including:
- An Overview of Teaching Social Action
- Organizing Your Class
- Issue Development & Choosing Campaigns
- Change Theory & Building Power
- Research & Group Dynamics
- Strategy & Tactics
- Campaign Kick-Off
- Campaign Plan & Evaluation
Here is a graph of how these course topics flow in Scott’s social action course:
Over the two-days, participants will meet each day for discussions about your goals, course models, teaching approach, and sharing examples and exercises that will help you plan your social action course or workshop series. Institute participants will work with this course planning worksheet (below), which explores many of the issues that arise when teaching social action.
At the conclusion of the institute, we will invite participants to join a year-long support and networking community of fellow practitioners who are teaching or learning how to teach social action using this experiential, real-world model. You will also be added to the Teaching Social Action Email Discussion Group to give faculty, staff, and students a forum for asking questions, discussing active student campaigns, sharing successes and challenges, and announcing future opportunities for training, education, and reflection.