For a better experience, click the Compatibility Mode icon above to turn off Compatibility Mode, which is only for viewing older websites.

Community-Based Learning Courses

Students can take courses across majors that contain a Community Based Learning component. Building upon the foundations established in CIVC 101, these courses provide students with an opportunity to gain real world skills by partnering with a community organization.

To view current and upcoming courses, please see below. CRNs link to the Term Master Schedule

Questions? Please email Jennifer Johnson Kebea at jpj38@drexel.edu.

Winter Term 2018-2019

College Course # CRN Course Title Instructor Date/Time Location
Westphal URBS 610-001 23382 Civic Engagement and Participatory Methods Andrew Zitcer Mondays 6pm-8:50pm Enterprise Center CDC
Course Description
Explores and examines how communities accomplish planned change through a number of models including community development, social planning, social action and public advocacy.
College Course # CRN Course Title Instructor Date/Time Location
CoAS COM 377-900 25285 Communication for Civic Engagement Lawrence Souder Online TBA
Course Description
Extremist rhetoric and divisive politics seem to go hand-in-hand in today’s public deliberations. The media so often pair the word rhetoric itself with the pejorative adjectives mere, empty, and deceptive, that anything rhetorical becomes vilified. This course draws from the ancient accounts of rhetoric and the contemporary studies on rhetoric to rehabilitate it as a way to inform our efforts towards a more civil public discourse. This course also will host guest speakers from local civic and political organizations who engage in rhetorical practices in the service of civic engagement, which includes the discourse both of people who exercise political power and of citizens who debate over public policies and cultural identity. Objectives Students who successfully complete this course will be able to: * describe the relationship between rhetoric and civic engagement (responsible citizenship*) * distinguish between just and unjust regards for an audience (ethical reasoning*) * identify strategic uses of language and arguments in debates over public policies and cultural identity (communication*) * evaluate arguments in the service of civic engagement for a community group (self-directed learning*) *Relevance to Drexel Student Learning Priorities
College Course # CRN Course Title Instructor Date/Time Location
Pennoni Honors College HNRS T 480-004 26405 Great Works: Othello Paula Marantz Cohen Wednesdays 10:00am-10:50am Dornsife Center for Neighborhood Partnerships
Course Description
This is a one-credit course on Shakespeare’s great 1603 tragedy, Othello. The play deals with a black war hero in late 16th century Venice who is misled by his jealous lieutenant to wrongfully suspect his wife of being unfaithful. The course will meet one hour a week during the ten-week term. We will read the play twice. The first reading will attend to the language and to general themes related to sexism, racism, and imperialism; the second reading will supplement this with historical and critical commentary from the Norton volume.
College Course # CRN Course Title Instructor Date/Time Location
CoAS CJS 260 22981 Justice in Our Community Cyndi Rickards Mondays 10am-11:50am Dornsife Center for Neighborhood Partnerships
Course Description
This course is a community-based learning course that will begin with an introduction to our local community and examine problems unique to cities. The majority of our instructional time will take place with our community partner. The synthesis of scholarship and community classroom experience will provide a holistic leans in which to explore issues in our urban community. Topics include: urban economies, access to education and health care, information justice, race and crime. Students meet for two hours in the classroom and work as Navigators at the Dornsife Center T, W or TH from 1-3 or 3-5. You will need to choose one shift to work each week, which will appear as a recitation on your schedule.
College Course # CRN Course Title Instructor Date/Time Location
CoAS WRIT 305 23473 Life is Beautiful Ken Bingham Thursdays 3:30pm-4:50pm Crossroads Hospice
Course Description
This community-based-learning course links memoir with life, story-telling, and dying. Specifically, the course partners students with local hospice patients to co-create a life-story for the patient and his or her family. Students learn interviewing, listening, and writing techniques as well as skills in analysis and presentation. Additionally, the course facilitates interactions with the community and helps students to see themselves as linked to a community outside of college.
College Course # CRN Course Title Instructor Date/Time Location
CoAS BIO 205 26136 Mobilizing the Scientific Method Karen Kabnick Mondays 4pm-5:50pm, Fridays 1pm-2:50pm TBD
Course Description
Students in Bio 205, a new Community-Based Learning course, will learn cooperatively with local high school students who will come to Drexel campus weekly. Drexel students will work with instructors to develop approaches to ask and answer scientific questions. Drexel students will then guide high school partners using a mentor-teacher model. We will use fast plants as our model organism to ask questions with controlled experiments, collect and interpret data, draw conclusions and redesign experiments based on those results. The goal of this course is to encourage collaborative learning through experimentation and mentoring.
College Course # CRN Course Title Instructor Date/Time Location
CoAS CJS 002 25890 Opening Doors: Aiding Reentry Douglas V. Porpora & Julia C. Richmond Thursdays 1pm-3:50pm Curran- Fromhold Correctional Facility
Course Description
This is an Inside-Out class in which Drexel Students will meet at Curran Fromhold Correctional Facility along with students resident there. Keep in mind this is not a service learning class, it is a side-by-side college course. The class will focus on professional transitions for both inside and outside students. Within the context of issues barring on race, class, and justice this course offers both theoretical and practical knowledge about the job market. Transportation will be provided from Main Campus.
College Course # CRN Course Title Instructor Date/Time Location
CoAS CJS 261 22974 Prison, Society & YOU Cyndi Rickards Thursdays 1pm-4pm Curran- Fromhold Correctional Facility
Course Description
This course utilizes the Inside-Out Prison Exchange Program to explore the relationship between individuals and the prison system. The Inside-Out Exchange Program is an evolving set of projects that creates opportunities for dialogue between those on the outside and those on the inside of the nation’s correctional facilities. The program demonstrates the potential for dynamic collaborations between institutions of higher education and correctional institutions. Most importantly, through this unique exchange, Inside-Out an this course seeks to deepen the conversation- and transform ways of thinking about crime and justice (Crabbe, Pompa, 2004) Course Goal and Mission: At the most basic level, this course and program allows students to go behind the walls to reconsider what they have learned about crime and justice, while those on the inside are encouraged to place their life experiences in a larger framework. Students will exchange ideas and perceptions about crime and justice, the criminal justice system, corrections and imprisonment. It is a chance for all participants to gain a deeper understanding of the criminal justice system through the marriage of theoretical knowledge and practical experience achieved by weekly meetings and extended throughout the semester. (Crabbe, Pompa, 2004).
College Course # CRN Course Title Instructor Date/Time Location
CoAS WRIT 215 23471 Story Medicine Nomi Eve Tuesdays/Thursdays 11am-12:20pm Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia
Course Description
This is a Community Based Learning Course in creative writing and Collaborative Creative Processes. Students go to Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) to perform in the Ryan Seacrest T.V. studio. Drexel Students write, perform and produce live shows for patients. Students will always use a teleprompter, so no memorization is necessary. Students regularly interact with patients who come down to participate in the Story Medicine show. All writing exercises are suitable for beginning and intermediate writers. Students undertake self-reflective writing, and become active participants in building this course for future quarters. Actors, singers, and dancers are welcome as this is a live performance class, but absolutely no performing experience is needed. Acting Practicum credit available (contact Nomi Eve nae28@drexel.edu for details)
College Course # CRN Course Title Instructor Date/Time Location
Westphal DSMR 311 21424 Visual Merchandising Kristen Ainscoe Tuesdays/Thursdays 4pm-5:50pm Philadelphia CDC's and BID Districts
Course Description
Visual Merchandising combines design skills, consumer psychology and marketing principles to create window displays, floor merchandising and plan-o-grams in a retail environment that entices consumers to buy. Students will investigate related areas of store planning and design, point-of-purchase display, fixture design, and topics on trend in the industry. Students will apply the principles and elements of design in merchandise presentation, analysis and experimentation and field research. Methods of promoting and selling merchandise, analyzing leading retail firms, employing basic methods of displaying merchandise, and developing a basic understanding of the use of materials and lighting will be integrated into experiential projects outside of the classroom. Each term students complete community store windows.This is a partnership that we have developed and continued for over 20 years. Students will get the opportunity to negotiate with a small business owner for the theme and story of the window. Students will write a contract and negotiate the logistics of the contract with the business owner. Students will create and develop sketches, explore materials based on a budget, make and install the window. Each group will need to balance the wants/needs of the client with good design based on the principles and elements of merchandising.

 

Fall Term 2018-2019

College Course # CRN Course Title Instructor Date/Time Location
CoAS CJS 261 13545 Prison, Society & YOU Cyndi Rickards Thursday 1pm-4pm Curran- Fromhold Correctional facility
Course Description
This course utilizes the Inside-Out Prison Exchange Program to explore the relationship between individuals and the prison system. The Inside-Out Exchange Program is an evolving set of projects that creates opportunities for dialogue between those on the outside and those on the inside of the nation’s correctional facilities. The program demonstrates the potential for dynamic collaborations between institutions of higher education and correctional institutions. Most importantly, through this unique exchange, Inside-Out an this course seeks to deepen the conversation- and transform ways of thinking about crime and justice (Crabbe, Pompa, 2004) Course Goal and Mission: At the most basic level, this course and program allows students to go behind the walls to reconsider what they have learned about crime and justice, while those on the inside are encouraged to place their life experiences in a larger framework. Students will exchange ideas and perceptions about crime and justice, the criminal justice system, corrections and imprisonment. It is a chance for all participants to gain a deeper understanding of the criminal justice system through the marriage of theoretical knowledge and practical experience achieved by weekly meetings and extended throughout the semester. (Crabbe, Pompa, 2004).
College Course # CRN Course Title Instructor Date/Time Location
CoAS CJS 260A 15458 Justice in Our Community Cyndi Rickards Monday 10am-12pm + Recitation Section Dornsife Center for Neighborhood Partnerships
Course Description
This course is a community-based learning course that will begin with an introduction to our local community and examine problems unique to cities. The majority of our instructional time will take place with our community partner. The synthesis of scholarship and community classroom experience will provide a holistic leans in which to explore issues in our urban community. Topics include: urban economies, access to education and health care, information justice, race and crime. Students meet for two hours in the classroom and work as Navigators at the Dornsife Center T, W or TH from 1-3 or 3-5. You will need to choose one shift to work each week, which will appear as a recitation on your schedule.
College Course # CRN Course Title Instructor Date/Time Location
CoAS COM376-900 13129 Nonprofit Communication Lawrence Souder Online Online
Course Description
All nonprofit organizations must develop and maintain effective communication strategies in order to survive in a competitive economy. Nonprofits have unique needs and limitations in their long-term goals and short-term operations that relate to communication. This course introduces students to the ways nonprofits communicate with both their constituents and their benefactors and the ways researchers have examined these practices. Students will explore these two perspectives on nonprofit communication through a combination of scholarly readings, dialogues with local representatives in the nonprofit sector, and direct contact and work for a local nonprofit organization. This course articulates with the content and goals of other courses in the Department of Communication, specifically COM280 (Public Relations), COM220 (Qualitative Research Methods), COM282 (Public Relations Writing), COM286 (Public Relations Strategies and Tactics), COM675 (Grant Writing for the Arts and Humanities), and COM680 (Public Relations Writing and Strategies). Questions of interest are: What is the nature of a nonprofit organization? How are nonprofit organizations governed? Who are the various stakeholders in a nonprofit’s community? What particular and unique kinds of formal communications do nonprofits engage in?
College Course # CRN Course Title Instructor Date/Time Location
CoAS WRIT 215 34094 Story Medicine Nomi Eve Tuesday/Thursday 11am-12:20pm Children's Hospital of Philadelphia
Course Description
This is a Community Based Learning Course in Fiction Writing and Collaborative Creative Processes. Students go to Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) to perform in the Ryan Seacrest T.V. studio. Drexel Students write, perform and produce live shows for patients. Students will always use a teleprompter, so no memorization is necessary. Students regularly interact with patients who come down to participate in the Story Medicine show. All writing exercises are suitable for beginning and intermediate fiction writers. Ultimately, students will undertake self-reflective writing, and become active participants in building this course for future quarters.
College Course # CRN Course Title Instructor Date/Time Location
CoAS BIO T280 16326 Connections in Life Sciences Mariah Beaver and Monica Togna Monday/Wednesday 3:30pm-4:50pm Alain Locke Elementary School
Course Description

Connections in Life Sciences is a new open enrollment course designed and intended to allow students to build connections with fundamental biology and their community which together will develop their future professional and personal pursuits. Each week a new insight into genetics that ranges from plants to the human brain will give students the opportunity to learn and to share that knowledge with the Philadelphia community. The course is designed on the Community Based Learning platform (CBL) and is scheduled to meet twice a week: one meeting will be a formal lecture on campus and one meeting will be at a partnered elementary school with the instructor and Drexel students leading an 8 week after school science club. Course assignments focus on taking a particular concept or skill learned in one of our Drexel courses, connecting it to the lesson demonstrated at the elementary school that week, researching real world applications of that technique, and identifying careers which would utilize that technique or concept. Students will gain an introduction to civic engagement, benefit from community based learning practices and connect their Drexel course material to the bigger picture in their lives.
College Course # CRN Course Title Instructor Date/Time Location
CoAS PHIL 105 16286 Critical Reasoning Stacey Elizabeth Ake Thursday 1pm-3:50pm Curran-Fromhold Correctional Facility
Course Description Introduces and develops the skills involved in reasoning effectively about experience, and being able to distinguish strong arguments from weak ones. This course utilizes the Inside-Out Prison Exchange Program. Drexel students will travel each week to the jail to meet with the other half of the class, men who are incarcerated. Collectively, Drexel and incarcerated students will learn critical reasoning as colleagues for the ten-week term.