By Beth Cavanaugh

Students harvest vegetables they grew at the Engaged University’s Master Peace Community Garden.

Just a few miles from the University of Maryland, in a renovated school, one organization operates with a very big mission—to bring together the university and the community. The Engaged University, part of Maryland Cooperative Extension, was created more than five years ago as a way to more fully connect students, faculty and staff with the greater College Park community.

Located at the Center for Educational Partnership in Riverdale, the Engaged University is home to various university-community partnerships that through creative partnering promote mutual learning and work to enhance the quality of life for all.According to its director, Margaret Morgan-Hubbard, the mission of the 6-year-old organization is to extend campus boundaries—resulting in a unified, interdependent community.

“Collaboration and community engagement does not happen on its own. Our organization serves as a catalyst for this process,” says Morgan-Hubbard.“As a leading research institution, Maryland, through programs such as the Engaged University, provides students with important opportunities to apply concepts they are learning in the classroom and lab,” says Gloria Aparicio, assistant to the vice president for administrative affairs. “Students are out in the real world, testing models and taking this information back to their classes.”

For the past two years, the Engaged University has partnered with the College Park Scholars Public Leadership Program, a themed living-learning program for academically talented first- and second-year students. Scholars work with area middle schools on a variety of after school experiential learning programs. Through this collaboration, scholars are introduced to public leadership, citizenship and civic engagement— gaining a better understanding of self-identity, community development and multi-cultural education.

In addition to scholars, students from Maryland’s Alternative Spring Break Program have joined with the Engaged University on a community project. In 2007, a group of 12 students, along with several community members, spent their week-long spring break working with students from William Wirt Middle School to build a garden at the Center for Educational Partnership. The garden, named the Master Peace Community Garden by neighborhood youth, is 10,000 square feet and includes space for local youth and families to grow and harvest their own vegetable, as well as a communal area with picnic tables.

Throughout the year, students from Wirt’s Garden Club work with Maryland students to design, plant, maintain and harvest the vegetable garden. Its surplus harvest is sold at the Riverdale Farmers Market–providing students with additional lessons in marketing and entrepreneurship. In the winter months, when it is too cold to garden, the focus of the garden club turns to cooking and nutrition. Students learn about different foods and how to prepare nutritious and healthy meals.

“The exposure that local youth and college students receive through Engaged University programs and partnerships goes beyond books and tests,” says Morgan-Hubbard. “Through new experiences that engage their minds and their bodies, they grow more inquisitive about their local community and the world beyond.”

Students test drive bikes earned through the Engaged University’s Earn-a-Bike program.

The Renaissance Community Bike Shop is another program that encourages students to explore and learn through experience. Founded in the spring of 2007, this venture provides local youth and community members with hands-on instruction in bike repair and maintenance. The shop also offers information on bike safety, and participants can earn a bike by volunteering time in the shop. Donated and discarded bikes, collected from the university and the community, are repaired and used as part of the Earn-a-Bike Program. Since the shop opened, 12 Wirt middle schoolers have earned bikes through volunteering, 30 youth have completed the bicycle safety and maintenance course and a fleet of 20 bikes have been refurbished for group trips.

“We educate young people about bicycles as an environmentally friendly and viable form of transportation and recreation,” says Morgan-Hubbard. “Our participants experience the joy of breathing new life into something old.”

For more information on the Engaged University and its many program offerings, visit their Web site: http://engagedu.umd.edu.

Additional Programs Offered by the Engaged University:

The Mural Project

By collaborating with local artists, teachers and UM students, the Engaged University conducts community art workshops and provides training and technical assistance to groups in community art projects. Student artists in the Mural Project can be commissioned to design and paint community murals. Students’ work can be found on display at the Center for Educational Partnership and local public schools.

Summer Enrichment and Afterschool Programs

Featuring music, dance, performance art and photography, the Engaged University’s summer enrichment and afterschool programs strengthen participants’ academic, communication and social skills while teaching them how to live a healthier life and acquire a new art or craft.

Free Minds Collective

The Free Minds Collective offers a comprehensive selection of classes designed to expand the knowledge and experiences of emerging student leaders. The program includes weekly excursions to area parks and recreation facilities; small intensive academic classes in reading and writing, psychology, history and music appreciation, and workshops in arts and culture.

Below, tell us about ways that your unit is involved with the community.