Monday, February 6, 2012

AAC&U's "Bringing Theory to Practice" Project

The Bringing Theory to Practice Project (BTtoP) encourages colleges and universities to reassert their core purposes as educational institutions not only to advance learning and discovery, but to advance the potential and well-being of each individual student, and to advance education as a public good that sustains a civic society.

The Evidence to Date: Highlights from the BTtoP Retrieval Conference
This past June, fifty-five representatives from a wide range of BTtoP-funded campuses gathered in Washington, DC, to engage in discussions to literally “retrieve” what we know about the connections between engaged learning, civic engagement, and the psychosocial well-being of students, and what happens when institutions implement initiatives aimed at strengthening these relationships.

BTtoP Campus Highlight: Heritage University: Transforming Student Stories
Student stories revealed multiple needs but also strengths and effective strategies being used by individual students and the institution. Faculty reading these reflections immediately expressed an even stronger appreciation for the need to keep student voices in the forefront of our decision making and daily practice.

Assessment Highlight: SUNY Cortland
As a recipient of a Bringing Theory to Practice demonstration site award, SUNY Cortland’s primary objectives have been to assess the effect of high-impact learning practices, such as civic engagement and service learning, on the psychosocial well-being of students.

Dylan Joyce Works at BTtoP: A Somewhat Interesting 900-Word Contextualization
We live in challenging times. In a country composed of those who define ourselves by our work, our money and status, and our autonomy, we continue to face record levels of unemployment and underemployment, widening economic and social inequity, and a governing structure that many feel neither effectively responds to the needs of those it governs nor allows for an environment in which those governed can effectively fulfill their own needs. But our challenge is to help define our circumstances rather than be defined by them. What we do now determines not only who we will become as individuals, but what we will become as a society.

BTtoP National Civic Seminar: Report to the Nation Calls for Renewing the Civic Mission of Higher Education
The Task Force on Civic Learning and Democratic Engagement, on which both I and AAC&U President Carol Geary Schneider served, consulted with many educational leaders and practitioners and staff members from the Department of Education for more than a full year prior to the release of A Crucible Moment: Civic Learning and Democracy's Future. Those meetings resulted in the report’s recommendations, which are designed to re-center civic learning within higher education’s overall mission and catalyze strategic actions to make civic learning a key part of every college student’s educational experience.
In Brief

    * Look for BTtoP’s Fourth Round of Funding for 2012-2014
    * September 23-24 Dinner and Strategic Meeting and BTtoP Decennial Report
    * Bringing Theory to Practice Publishes New Book on Transforming Undergraduate Education


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