Engagement means building trust, enhancing shared belonging, enabling agency, developing capacity, and amplifying dignity.
We believe more is always possible and we strive to build it together.
Our Key Commitments
Equity
We understand that sustainability requires equity. Relationships that are not mutually nourishing do not last. We build engagement structures that benefit everyone involved.
Diversity
We know that non-homogenous teams are more innovative and solve complex problems better and faster than homogenous ones. Diversity is excellence and our engagement teams are diverse.
Intersectionality
We know that people and communities have more than a single identity. Our teams understand that community identities are multiple and impact on another in unique and important ways.
Humility
We understand that in addition being a great character trait, humility is also an important method for surfacing knowledge in groups. Our engagements center humility.
Interrelatedness
We know that our complex interconnection means that we cannot just think about individuals, or communities, or institutions, or ecosystems. Responsible citizenship requires that we consider the impacts of our decisions and actions at all of these levels.
Experience and research have taught us a lot about how engagement is best undertaken. We value evidence-based best practices.
We also know that we learn by doing because the world is a rapidly changing and complex system. We also value practice-based knowledge production.
In the College of Arts and Sciences we match what we have learned with our Key Commitments when planning how we engage with partners.
Some things we have learned:
- Institutions like ours have a tremendous opportunity to enhance relationships with community and other partners
- Addressing challenges in this complex world means responding to changing conditions and centering the experiences of people impacted by what we do
- Creating sustained and mutually beneficial relationships is essential to building trust and amplifying impact
- While there are many ways to do it, engagement is most nourishing when grounded in key commitments
