The role of the university and its relationship to the community has long been a highly debated topic among educators, administrators, and local business leaders. David J. Maurrasse offers a passionate appeal for community partnerships. Going further than a simple explanation of the problems at hand, Beyond the Campus offers a road map for both universities and local institutions to work together for the good of their communities.

This book explores the opportunities and limitations of campus-community partnerships in Israel. In a conflict-ridden society with a struggling civic culture, the chapters examine partnerships at ten academic institutions, focusing on the micro-processes through which these partnerships work from the perspectives of students, NGOs, and disadvantaged communities. The editors and contributors analyse the range of strategies and cultural repertoires used to construct, maintain, negotiate and resist the various partnerships. Evaluating the various challenges raised by campus-community partnerships exposes the institutional and epistemological divides between academia and the community, and thus offers valuable insights into the ways partnerships can contribute to transformative change in conflict zones. This book will be of interest and value to researchers and students of campus-community partnerships as well as the anthropology of inclusion-exclusion and civic culture.

While an increasing number of universities have or are committed to engaging their campuses in their surrounding communities, many recognize they lack the strategic focus and resources to maximize and sustain their impact on those communities. Place-based community engagement provides a powerful way to creatively connect campus and community to foster positive social transformation.In developing community engagement strategies, most universities and community organizations face significant challenges in deciding who to partner with and why. Frequently this leads universities and community organizations to say “yes” to too many opportunities which significantly limit their ability to pursue long-term impact. Focusing on an established geographic area can make it much easier to decide where to deploy resources and which partnerships to prioritize and thus increase their ability to form strong and sustainable partnerships that are of greater value to all stakeholders.This book presents the emerging model of place-based community engagement as a powerful process for attaining more positive and enduring results in their local communities as well as stimulating wider engagement by campus constituencies. Drawing upon the concept of collective impact and using data-driven decision making, place-based initiatives build long-term partnerships based upon a shared vision. Done thoughtfully, these place-based initiatives have attained impressive results.Drawing upon the case studies of five institutions that have implemented place-based community engagement initiatives, the authors provide guidance on the opportunities, challenges, and considerations involved in putting a place-based approach into effect. By sharing the experiences of these five institutions, they describe in detail the routes each took to turn their place-based initiatives from concept to reality, and the results they achieved.

Creating Community on College Campuses addresses the most critical and difficult issues facing higher education in the 1990s: improving the quality of teaching and learning, raising academic standards, protecting freedom of expression, and simultaneously enhancing community of the whole and community of the parts. This book offers an understanding of community as a complex concept, one that incorporates the values of a democratic society and encourages learning and participation by all citizens of the campus, and discusses topics such as race and ethnicity, the climate for women, harassment and free speech, alcohol, crime, Greek life, and interaction among faculty and students. The authors conclude with concrete recommendations to support the implementation of pluralistic learning communities on our nation's campuses.