Defining Civic Engagement

We were working on content for Wagner College's Center for Leadership and Engagement website when we encountered the daunting task of trying to put forward a clear and useful definition of civic engagement. One definition we played with goes something like this:

Wagner College has a long history of promoting civic learning and engagement through its highly integrated academic curriculum and its robust co-curricular offerings. At least since the 1998 launch of the Wagner Plan for the Practical Liberal Arts, the college has demonstrated its commitment to “learning by doing” through clusters of courses called learning communities linked to real-world, community-based situations. Over time, this twin commitment to enriched student learning through community engagement and to utilizing Wagner’s strengths to address a variety of community challenges has only intensified.  Civic engagement encompasses a wide array of activities at Wagner College that include close observations of community practitioners, active participation in the work of key community organizations, and neighborhood-based inquiry and research. All of these activities are centered on connecting our students and faculty to the larger community to enrich academic learning and to promote the well-being of our community partners. 

Wagner has learned over time that civic learning and engagement should include the following:

• ·       Consciously and meaningfully connecting classroom learning to existing community realities;
• ·       Encouraging student participation in hands-on, community-based activities;
• ·       Systematically reflecting on place-based experiences to foster deeper explorations of the roots of pressing community issues and to help students understand the impact of their own civic contributions;
• ·       Guiding students toward seeing themselves as co-authors in defining and developing the College’s civic mission;
• ·       Increasing appreciation for the value of civic knowledge and collaborating with others to take action in the community to advance the public good.

For Wagner, then, civic engagement can be summed up as follows. It entails rich civic learning and engagement building on classroom-based theoretical knowledge, deepening student understanding through community-based activity and critical reflection, raising civic consciousness and commitment, and fostering student empowerment through actual, hands-on participation in addressing real issues facing real communities.