Capital University, under new leadership from Beth Paul, Ph.D., will soon offer a new route to student community engagement. Out of a partnership with The Corella & Bertram Bonner Foundation, Capital students will have access to neighborhood-centric work-study programs through a network of national and local non-profits.
Paul has worked with the Bonner Foundation as an educator at previous universities, so she’s no stranger to university-community collaboration. She started her career as a professor, and was a rather rare form of faculty member, exhibiting passion for working alongside students in these community efforts, said Bobby Hackett, Bonner Foundation President. And, although she’s been “lost to the administration,” Hackett acknowledges what impact a president can make in a higher education community.
Specifically, Paul hopes to tackle issues like infant mortality, housing foreclosure, youth mentorship and small business development in the Near East Side, particularly in the Driving Park neighborhood. Students who participate in the four-year work-study program will both learn and engage in these issues, as well as earn a paycheck.
“Our work is not to come into a community and impose ourselves on a community,” Paul said. “It really is to work side by side with the community as part of the community so that we can all figure out what the priorities are, and then all collaboratively put our heads together to figure out what we can do to make the biggest difference.”
Students’ community service will start simple and work into more involved efforts each year. They’ll be able to choose a preferred focus, invest time in relevant non-profits, gain experience, and go on to do tasks like policy development and research for funding. As they move through each school year, the first class of 15 will multiply to 60, and when those students graduate, the resulting alumni base has an everlasting impact on the university they leave behind.
“The other thing that happens is that they become leaders in the university community to really build this into the university ethos and gain more student involvement, more staff and faculty involvement,” Paul said. “They end up being the magnet that really pulls people into this effort, so it really is an environment-changing kind of program.”
Starting in the fall 2018, Capital University will implement the program with current students and eventually expand it to include prospective students, “including those from Columbus City Schools’ ‘I Know I Can’ and United Way’s E3 participants.”