2012-13 Warren Wilson College Service Program Annual Report

SERVICE PROGRAM OFFICE 2012-2013 Annual Report

The mission of the Warren Wilson College Service Program is to prepare students for effective community engagement.

We fulfill our mission by: · Providing opportunities for students to gain relevant knowledge, skills and experiences, · Supporting students in the development of civic responsibility, and · Engaging in mutually beneficial community partnerships.

From the Dean of Service

Greetings, This year was a very successful one in the Service Program with new beginnings, continued successes and the revival of some exciting initiatives. We implemented the Community Engagement Commitment, our new developmentally based service requirement for students.

Based on two years of study, research and planning this unique and innovative model moves us from an hours based requirement to a commitment that asks all students to engage more deeply in exploring their own passions and also in understanding the social and environmental issues that they care about.

In support of our new model, we have continued to increase the number and the quality of our coursebased service-learning opportunities with more faculty teaching more courses than ever before. We have also re-energized our issue workshop offerings providing education, direct service and advocacy opportunities around specific topics. Finally, our relationships with community partners continue to grow and we are excited to have a vibrant 10-member Community Partner Advisory Board to consult with us on making sure our program meets community needs in a meaningful way.

It is a time of transition, excitement, growth and all the challenges that go along with that for our program. We appreciate the broad support we receive from both campus and community partners and collaborators and look forward to another productive year ahead!

Best, Cathy

Honor Roll With Distinction

Top 10 Ranking

Top 25 Academic Programs to Look For

2012-2013 Service Program Recognition 2013

Service Category

Service-Learning 2

Service Program Staff Cathy Kramer Dean of Service Shuli Archer Director of Student Engagement Karen Kyle Service Coordinator Siti Kusujiarti Faculty Liaison for Service-Learning Brooke Millsaps Director of Service-Learning Jacqui Trillo AmeriCorps VISTA

Community Partner Advisory Committee Norma Brown Children First/Communities in Schools Ashley Campbell Homeward Bound Jamye Davis Big Brothers Big Sisters Jill Edwards Town of Black Mountain Bob Gale Western North Carolina Alliance Jay Lively Asheville City Schools Foundation

Service Program Advisory Committee

Sophia Papadopoulos Friends and Neighbors of Swannanoa

Faculty Amy Boyd • Siti Kusujiarti • Lucy Lawrence Erin Montero • Marty O’Keefe • Graham Paul

Susan Sides The Lord’s Acre

Students Marissa Bramlett • Felicia Hall Isabel Harger • Beau Ohlgren • Ilinca Popescu Emily Sprouse • Nora White

Jack St. Clair Black Mountain Neuro-Medical Treatment Center Mike Stevenson Loving Food Resources

Staff Dustin Rhodes • Dan Seeger Wendy Seligman • Ally Wilson

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Bonner Leaders Service Crew 2012-2013 Bonner Senior Interns Meron Amare Emily Chiara

The Warren Wilson College Bonner Leader Program is supported in part through the Corella and Bertram F. Bonner Foundation, which provides funding, training and technical assistance to community service and service-learning scholarship and leadership programs at colleges and universities across the eastern United States. The mission of the Bonner Foundation is to transform the lives of students, their campuses and local communities through providing access to education and the experience to serve. 20-25 Warren Wilson students participate on the Bonner Leaders Service crew and their efforts are centralized through the College's Service Program. As crew members in the Warren Wilson College Work Program, students dedicate 15 hours per week to the establishment and leadership of community engagement activities such as co-curricular and service -learning projects, alternative break trips and issue education workshops.

Bonner Leaders Service Crew Marissa Bramlett Rob Compton Deanna Dragan Caroline Duble Rita Gunter Iliana Hernandez

1st Year Trip The First Year Trip takes first year crew members to participate in educational and service activities in a geographic region outside their campus community. This year, 11 crew members and 1 staff member travelled to Washington, DC for a trip focused on advocacy and engagement. Highlights of the trip include: visits to DC landmarks, a panel presentation by non-profit leaders, and service as peacekeepers for a march for marriage equality.

Internships

Lia Kaz Hannah Kilpatrick Ana Lara Ben Malmborg Autum Martin Manhattan MathurinNeville Blanca Perez Misha Perez

2nd Year Exchange The second year exchange facilitates community building in the larger Bonner network and provides the opportunity for training, service and reflection. This year, WWC hosted Bonner scholars from Wofford College. Together, WWC and Wofford students participated in WWC’s Spring Into Action conference, a student-run conference focused on engagement, advocacy, and action. The day ended with time to reflect on the workshops and learn more about the similarities and differences between the two schools.

Emma Post Delilah Scott Samrawit Sisay Emily Sprouse Emma Van Scoy Nora White Vivian Williamson Amanda Wilson Jasmine Woo

Presentations Crew members present at various conferences, both on and off campus, throughout the year. Presentations this year included: The WWC Community Engagement Commitment - NC Campus Compact Student Conference, Wilmington, NC The Language of Service - Warren Wilson College MLK Day Conference Spirituality and Service - IMPACT, Albuquerque, NM The Language of Service - Warren Wilson College Spring Into Action Conference

Each year the Service Program is able to offer scholarships to Bonner Leaders Service Crew students to engage in internships around the country and the world.

In the summer of 2012, six students received funding: Meron Amare - Counseling Intern Mountain BizWorks - Asheville, NC Emily Chiara - Garden Intern The Lord’s Acre - Fairview, NC Autum Martin - Farm Intern Garden Raised Bounty (GRuB) Olympia, WA Blanca Perez - Education Outreach Intern South Central Farmers’ Health & Education Fund - Los Angeles, CA Breanna Ryan - English Teacher Love Volunteers - Rabat, Morocco Nora White - Garden Intern Bread & Roses - Olympia, WA 4

During the 2012-2013 academic year,

818 Warren Wilson College Students served over 275 Community Partners and engaged in over 54,613 hours of service to

Year in Review

local, national, and global communities.

Campus Groups B T ! N#$%!&' Work Crews 9 crews engaged in 632.5 hours of service Athletic Teams 4 athletic teams engaged in 690 hours of service Campus Organizations & Residence Life 2 organizations and multiple residence life communities engaged in 159 hours of service Aquatics • Campus Support • Ceramics • Environmental Justice • Forestry Landscaping • Library • Basketball • Old Time String Band • Rentals & Renovations Residence Hall • Swim Team • Women’s Basketball • Women’s Soccer 5

Break Trip Program Each year, student co-leaders plan and facilitate weeklong service experiences for a group of Warren Wilson College students. Students spend the week learning about an issue and engaging in service with the community.

Year in Review

Fall Break •

4o students participated in 4 trips and completed 1,411 hours of service

Spring Break •

45 students participated in 5 trips and completed 1,608 hours of service

I left the trip feeling incredibly inspired and impassioned. I felt this strong need to change everything about my life at Wilson. I changed my major, my work crew, my housing situation. I realized that if I was going to be anywhere close to being as happy and driven as the people I had met on my trip that I needed to start with myself. I needed to change my path so that I could eventually go on to help others on their path. I met so many people who were beautiful examples of how it really only takes one person who is willing to commit to a cause to make a viable difference to a community. I have never felt as hopeful about the future as I did when I left New York that week. - WWC Break Trip Participant

90% of students agreed or strongly agreed that they have a deeper understanding of the issue as a result of the Break Trip experience.

89% of students have a better understanding about how to get involved in the trip’s social and/or environmental issue as a result of their break trip experience.

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Fall 2012 Break Trips Camping on Cumberland: Preserving a Georgia Barrier Island Dumping in Dixie: Environmental Discrimination and Community Marginalization in New Orleans Growing Apples in the Big Apple: Urban Agriculture and Community Sustainability in New York City Shovels ‘N’ Rope: Land Conservation in Muir Valley, KY

Spring 2013 Break Trips Living La Vida Local: Agricultural Approaches to Food Security in Buncombe County, NC Missouri Loves Company…And Conservation!: Conservation and Education in St. Louis, MO Rally in Raleigh: Community Development in Sanford, NC Shovels ‘N’ Rope: Land Conservation in Muir Valley, KY Spreading the Mulch: Expanding Access to Farming in Lynchburg, VA

WWC was recognized by Break Away as #2 in the country for “Highest Percentage of Breakers on Campus.”

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Issue Area Programming Issue area programming is led by our Bonner Leaders Service Crew. Crew members collaborate with community partners to organize and facilitate ongoing service opportunities and issue workshops for other Warren Wilson College students. Issue workshops are designed to deepen students'

Year in Review

understanding of and involvement with a particular issue through education and action.

Issue Workshops This year, issue workshops were revitalized with 11 Bonner Leaders facilitating and 32 Warren Wilson students participating in the workshops. Through this program, students have the opportunity to engage in an 8-week-long workshop focusing on issue education, action, and policy and/or advocacy work, thus strengthening their understanding of the complexity of the issue and their capacity to be effectively involved.

“I had such a great experience for sure, and I feel like I have a great appreciation for what a community garden can mean and symbolize to individuals (as a result of this workshop).”

–WWC Issue Workshop Participant

By the Numbers: When asked “As a result of this workshop…”

•

82.8% of students responded that they can identify root causes of the issue.

•

81.07% of students indicated they would continue to engage with the issue and/or agency they partnered with.

“The long-term effect the Housing and Homelessness experience has had on my life stretches even further since I have incorporated what I learned into my studies at Warren Wilson in Social Work and into other experiences where I engaged in strengthening community relationships.”—WWC Issue Workshop Participant 8

The Service Program has given increased attention to strengthening partnerships in the following five issue areas.

The ongoing partnerships facilitated by the Bonner Leader Service Crew and the overall student engagement within these issue areas are shown below.

Environment: Students served 15,433 hours Regular Service Opportunities: Home weatherization for low-income families Issue Workshop: Land Conservation Key Community Partners: Asheville Greenworks, Community Action Opportunities, Western North Carolina Alliance

Food Security: Students served 7,644 hours Regular Service Opportunities: 2 community gardens, local food bank, and local food pantry Issue Workshop: Community Gardens & Empowerment Key Community Partners: Black Mountain Community Garden, Loving Food Resources, MANNA Food Bank, The Lord’s Acre

Housing & Homelessness: Students served 4,524 hours Regular Service Opportunities: Move-ins and canvassing with a permanent housing program Issue Workshop: Housing First Key Community Partners: Habitat for Humanity, Homeward Bound

Race & Immigration: Students served 2,023 hours Regular Service Opportunities: Leadership development with Latino youth; community dialogue on race Issue Workshop: Collaborated with Community Gardens & Empowerment and Education Reform workshops Key Community Partners: Building Bridges, Buncombe County Migrant Education Program, Emma Family Resource Center

Youth & Education: Students served 12,998 hours Regular Service Opportunities: 3 mentoring programs Issue Workshop: Education Reform Key Community Partners: ArtSpace Charter School, Asheville City Schools Foundation, Big Brothers Big Sisters, Buncombe County - Owen District schools

Other Issue Areas

In addition to the five key issue area partners, Warren Wilson College also partners with the following agencies

Regular Service Opportunities: Animal Welfare -Weekly caretaking of animals at an animal shelter; Health - participate in weekly music activity with residents of health care center.

Key Community Partners: Animal Compassion Network, Black Mountain Neuro-Medical Treatment Center, Friends and Neighbors of Swannanoa (FANS), Global Village, Just Economics 9

Service-Learning Service-Learning has a long history at Warren Wilson College and continues to evolve. In the past two years an increasing number of faculty have engaged with service-learning and students have increased community engagement through service-learning courses by 60%.

By The Numbers

Year in Review

47 Courses •

8 First Year Seminars

•

4 study abroad courses

•

2 immersion experiences

368 students served 8,075 hours through service-learning courses 26 faculty, representing 11 departments, taught servicelearning courses Departments with Service-Learning Courses Anthropology • Biology • Chemistry • Education • Environmental Studies First Year Seminar • Global Studies • Modern Languages • Outdoor Leadership Psychology • Social Work

“I think the course concepts were very intertwined with the service trips. The classroom concepts were not only demonstrated, but served as a framework for how to reflect and engage with the service. Really enjoyable and fruitful experience.”

- WWC Service-Learning Student

81.07% of students agreed or strongly agreed that service-learning strengthened the learning experience of the course.

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Service-Learning Fellows Program In its second year, the Service-Learning Fellows Program invited community partners, faculty and students to participate and adopted a hybrid model of individual and team participants.

Individual Fellows Jill Edwards - Community Partner with the Town of Black Mountain.

Will partner with Biology Plant Physiology Course in 2014-2015 Jeff Keith - Global Studies Faculty GBL 298 - Engaging Appalachia Jay Lively - Community Partner with Asheville City Schools Foundation.

Partnering with 2 First Year Seminars: Voices of the Caribbean and Music of the 19th and 20th Centuries Erin Montero - Modern Languages Faculty LAN 353 - Latin American Culture Julie Wilson - Director of Writing Center WRI 120 - College Composition I: Incarceration

“I really enjoyed being part of a group that included students, community partners, and faculty. This is a phenomenal part of the program.” - 2013 Service-Learning Fellow Team Fellows Sydney Idzikowski Student Lucy Lawrence Social Work Faculty Deborah Lundy Community Partner with First at Blue Ridge SWK 320 - Practice I course Jessa Madosky Biology/Environmental Studies Faculty Sue Stuska Community Partner with National Park Service Kelly Wilson Student ENS 310 - Conservation Biology

“I loved being able to work with my team in order to shape our service-learning course. The guidance from the workshops helped substantially and I'm really glad I took part in it!”

- 2013 Service-Learning Fellow The 2013 Service-Learning Fellows Program was funded by the Black Mountain - Swannanoa Valley Foundation, Lipscomb Family Foundation Fund, and Janirve Legacy Fund of The Community Foundation of Western North Carolina.

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At the beginning of each semester, the Service Program organizes an orientation service event for all new students.

Year in Review

Service Day: Fall orientation with focus on food security: •

19 Community Partners, including school gardens, community gardens and food banks

•

Over 300 participants

•

Over 1,700 hours served

MLK Challenge: Winter orientation with focus on education •

Partnered with Hall Fletcher Elementary

•

25 students participated

•

Over 150 hours served

Each year the Service Program recognizes the exceptional service careers of graduating seniors and one faculty, staff member and community partner.

Orientation Senior Service Awards

Senior Service Award Winners Tsepak Dolker • Meron Amare • Nicholas Biemiller Emily Chiara • Felicia Hall • Casey McManus Courtney Newsome • Beau Ohlgren The Andrew Summers Award for Faculty Leadership in Service-Learning Annie Jonas - Education Department The Tom Crumpler Award for Staff Leadership in Service Dan Seeger - Director of Student Activities The Grace Lee Peace Community Partner Award Bob Gale - Western North Carolina Alliance

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Service Hours by Geographic Area

2012-2013 by the Numbers

During the past few years, the Service Program has focused on developing key partnerships within the Asheville/Buncombe community in specific issue areas. Through this focused partnership development in our local community, we hope to have a greater community impact. This graph indicates that a significant portion of students’ community engagement occurs in the Asheville/Buncombe County region and that our increased efforts to engage students locally continue to be successful.

6,619 12% 2,427 5% Asheville/Buncombe Area

2,266 4%

International Projects North Carolina (except Buncombe County) United States (except North Carolina)

43,300 79%

Service Hours by Academic Year The following graph shows the breakdown of service hours by students’ year in school. Please note that community engagement hours through the Eco-team and MACFC work crews as well as ELC internships are excluded from this particular data set.

63 0%

6,220.65 21%

10,170 33% 1st Year 2nd Year 3rd Year 4th Year Other

6,010 20%

7,951.96 26%

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2012-2013 by the Numbers

Service Hours by Issue Area

The Service Program OďŹƒce focuses its programming around 5 issue areas: Environment, Food Security, Housing & Homelessness, Race & Immigration and Youth & Education. We also support students and faculty who pursue meaningful partnerships outside of these 5 areas. The graph below shows the issue areas in which Warren Wilson College students engaged during the 20122013 academic year.

18,000 16,000 14,000 12,000 10,000 8,000 6,000 4,000 2,000 0

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2012-2013 by the Numbers

5 Year Look at Total Service Hours

In the *2010-2011 academic year we started including student internship and work crew hours that are consistent with the goals of the Service Program and our external reporting. This includes Eco-team, MACFC, and Service Program work crews as well as Bonner, ELC, and Social Work Internships. Of particular interest to the Service Program is that the number of hours continues to increase at the same time that the number of students enrolled in the college each academic year has decreased. We infer from this that individually, students are engaging with more service each year.

60,000

50,000

40,000

30,000

20,000

10,000

0 Service Hours

2008-2009

2009-2010

*2010-2011

2011-2012

2012-2013

29,394

26,950

47,903

48,693

54,330

2008-2009

2009-2010

*2010-2011

2011-2012

2012-2013

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5 Year Look at Service Hours by Category

2012-2013 by the Numbers

During the past 5 years, the Service Program has changed focus on types of programming offered in order to better support student learning and respond more appropriately to community needs. Some particular points of consideration: •

The organization of the Bonner Leaders Service Crew has changed considerably since 2008 -2009. During the 2010-2011 academic year, the Service Program made a conscious choice to significantly decrease one-time trip offerings facilitated by the Bonner Leaders Service Crew and focus on more in-depth opportunities. As a result, the Bonner Leaders Service crew has been able to focus on strengthening the quality of community engagement and not just the quantity of opportunities. Additionally, crew members have increased the time in which they serve as resources for students interested in finding meaningful ways to engage in the community.

•

The Director of Service-Learning and Faculty Liaison for Service-Learning positions started during the 2009-2010 year. These positions focus primarily on academic initiatives and strengthening the quality and quantity of service-learning course offerings.

5 Year Look at Service Hours by Category 14,000 12,000 10,000 8,000 6,000 4,000 2,000 0 2008-2009

2009-2010

2010-2011

2011-2012

Break Trips

Campus and Non-Crew Led Groups

Individual

Orientation

SPO Crew-led Service

Service-Learning Courses

2012-2013

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