In this course, taught by Dr Erica Walls, students analyze how nonprofits/groups organize in pursuit of social justice/impact/change, examine strategies and tactics of social movements, identify provisions and gaps in U.S. social policy, and more. Throughout the semester, the course covers relevant theory, history, and current events, and partnered with DC-area nonprofits to critically evaluate causes, effects, and potential solutions to poverty.
In teams, students serve with a DC-area nonprofit that combats an issue related to poverty. The project required teams to work with the organization staff to design and implement an action plan to help meet their goals, track their time and progress, and share learning/experiences with others. This work helped fulfill the course learning objectives and invited reflection on student's beliefs about civic responsibility and their sense of purpose in the world.
Students’ service informs a scholarly paper and presentation on the influences on social change, particularly with respect to addressing poverty. This work invites reflection on students’ beliefs about civic responsibility and sense of purpose in the world.
For information about Community Engaged Scholarship at GW: https://go.gwu.edu/cesc
Spring 2024
Professor: Erica Walls
Students Reporting: TBD
Time Reported: TBD
Community Partner: Sasha Bruce Youthwork
Student Comments:
"I learned how difficult it can be to coordinate so many different individuals on different schedules, and learning how to verbalize ideas in ways that all can understand. Also, using feedback from the organization to tailor it to its needs was a helpful skill I got to enhance."
"I have loved working closely with the staff at SBY to tailor our project to what they experience in their everyday life at Sasha Bruce. It has been a test of my organization running point on emails, so timely responses, adequate notice, and time management has been tested greatly."
"I have learned so much about the barriers for youth to obtain stables homes in young adulthood especially when coming from unstable homes."
Fall 2023
Professor: Kimberly Aldridge
Students Reporting: 28
Time Reported: 614.71
Community Partners:
| CP | # of students at the site |
| Francis on the Hill | 3 |
| FRESHFARM FoodPrints | 4 |
| Horton’s Kids | 3 |
| Life Pieces to Masterpieces | 4 |
| AnBryce Foundation | 4 |
| Kappa Phi Lambda | 1 |
| Little Friends for Peace (LFFP) | 5 |
| Our Stomping Ground | 5 |
Student Comments:
“I had such a wonderful experience working with FreshFarm/FoodPrints this semester! I do believe the hours I logged in are reflective of work that I did to serve this organization in my group's pursuit of creating a pilot composting program at the School Without Walls. I anticipate collecting more hours even following the formal completion of this course, as my group will be supporting Ibti and our compost initiative after the class ends. These hours reflect grant writing, grant research, meetings with Ibti, educational material creation, and all other efforts that were engaged weekly to best serve this organization. I feel an immense sense of gratitude for having been introduced to this organization, and I really look forward to working with them in a volunteer capacity during the rest of my time here in D.C., as a student at GW.”- Student working with FRESHFARM/FoodPrints
"It was really interesting to learn how to fundraise and how to recruit volunteers."
“Working with the AnBryce team this semester was nothing short of perfect. I learned so much working with Donna White and Zanes Cypress. Through weekly meetings and interviews with different members of the organization, and a lot of research, my team and I were able to create a report that assessed the current usage of the organization's performance dashboard and made recommendations on how to improve the use of the dashboard, as well as the actual dashboard itself.”- Student working with AnBryce Foundation
Spring 2023
Professor: Erica Walls
Students Reporting: 29
Time Reported: 229 hours
Course Projects
| AnBryce Foundation | Students worked with AnBryce Foundation to bring in public speakers to talk to AnBryce's clients, helped plan events and curriculum for their summer camp, and ran social media advocacy campaigns. |
| Horton’s Kids | Students worked with Horton's Kids to develop a new Food and Nutrition program for clients and their families. Students developed cards for health conscious recipes that could be made with items from Horton's Kids food pantry. |
| Age-Friendly DC | Students worked with Age-Friendly DC to explore home-sharing opportunities in DC. By conducting research on intergenerational home sharing for aging adults and young people, students advocated for home sharing policies that could allow DC residents to "Age in Place" while providing affordable housing option for young adults in DC. Students presented their findings to members of the DC city council at the end of the semester. |
| Rock Creek Conservancy | Students worked with RCC to advocate for and raise awareness for the protection of Rock Creek Park and other natural areas in DC. Students helped to conduct social media campaigns and plan events to raise advocacy for RCC. |
| Jews United for Justice | Students worked with the organization to collect testimonies and do policy research surrounding a series of proposed legislation that would benefit residents in Maryland. |
| Latino Student Fund | Students worked with LSF to conduct advocacy campaigns over social media to raise awareness for mental health and nutrition. They also prepared deliverables to share with LSF clients on mental health and nutrition. |
Student Quotes
"I learned how to navigate the ways in which I could be helpful to a community in need of service as an outsider of that community. I also learned to re-assess when I felt I wasn't being as helpful as possible."
"I was able to really see all the work my group and I put in, in more tangible terms, which was really empowering."
"I found this entire project very rewarding. I was able to have a great conversation with the project supervisor and my selected speaker about the true purpose of Camp Dogwood and how it is improving the lives of so many kids. I feel proud that I was able to connect my speaker to the AnBryce Foundation as I feel her passions directly align with the organization's mission statement. Overall, this has been a very enjoyable experience."
Spring 2022
Instructor: Erica Walls
Students Reporting: 30
Time Reported: 752 Hours
“I am proud of the great work my students conducted this semester, serving 8 nonprofits throughout DC. Their experiences brought classroom learning to life, and taught lessons that can only be learned first-hand,” Professor Walls.
| Community Partner | Student Involvement | Number of Students |
| Pathways to Housing | Students spoke to individuals living in homeless encampments and conducted interviews for Pathways to Housing’s marketing efforts. As part of their project, they wrote summaries for the organization and led a final presentation as part of the group’s effort to shift the narrative people have about unhoused people. | 4 |
| Coalition for Nonprofit Housing and Economic Development | Students worked on a variety of marketing and design projects in partnership with the CNHED. Projects ranged from creating informational handouts on topics like digital equity for D.C.’s wards to developing digital deliverables to the organization’s comms team. | 4 |
| DC Action for Children | Students conducted outreach through calls to community members and educators, blogging, and research. As part of their project this group worked to build infographics; backgrounders on policy, past articles, and educator compensation; and slides presentations to aid the nonprofit’s marketing efforts. | 7 |
| Latin American Youth Center | Students visited the LAYC throughout the semester organizing workshops, discussions and developing mental health toolkits to share with the students who attended. Students aimed to help the teens further their understanding on the importance of mental health and destigmatize mental illnesses. | 4 |
| Children’s Defense Fund | Over the course of the semester, students facilitated community conversation with participants of the Children’s Defense Fund’s “The Block: Family Narratives for Collective Impact.” The project gathers stories that highlights concerns and challenges of families in Ward 8 directly from community members, who are attuned to the issues affecting their neighborhoods and their own priorities for change. | 4 |
| Latino Student Fund | This service project included working with LSF to create a newsletter for the organization to send out weekly with community members and leaders. Students also created a research-based presentation discussing issues with educational equity and LSF's mission. | 3 |
| Greater Brookland Intergenerational Village | Group members created and ran the Facebook and Instagram pages for the GBIV. Students communicated with the executive director of GBIV to produce content for the pages, including event postings and highlights. To create this content, they researched the Brookland area and held weekly meetings to create graphics and captions. Students also ran a volunteer tabling event in Kogan Plaza. | 3 |
| Serve Your City | Students worked with SYC to assist with grant research and updating some of the group’s community resources. Students updated spreadsheets and informational handouts about the group and available resources for guests. | 4 |
Quotes from students
“My perspective impacts the work I do with CNHED by allowing me to relate to some focuses, but forces me to open my mind to other issues, and to learn about them further. I can understand some of the stressors, but not all of them - and it reminds that I have to listen before I think of solutions because if I don’t, I’ll likely miss the problem entirely.” - A student volunteering with the Coalition for Nonprofit Housing and Economic Development
“As my group has continued to meet at least once a week with our organization, we have discussed developing trust building strategies with the communities we are serving, unlearning, and have spoken about white privilege. As an outsider I need to be conscious and intentional with my actions.” - A student working with Children’s Defense Fund
“Reciprocity is important because as students who are going out and spending time contributing to the community, we need to make sure that we are not only doing it for a grade in the class, but to learn from the experience” - A student working with DC Action for Children
“Service-learning is hands-on and is meant to be challenging and unexpected and maybe even messy.” - A student working with DC Action for Children
Spring 2021
Professors: Erica Walls and Gretchen Van der Veer
Students Reporting: 21
Time Reported: 408 hours
Community Partners
| Community Organization | Students Reporting (spring section) | Description |
| DC Action for Children | 5 | Managed social media including creating new content |
| Children’s Defense Fund | 4 | Designed marketing materials and created interview guides |
| The Coalition for Nonprofit Housing and Economic Development | 3 | Created an advocacy toolkit |
| Latino Student Fund | 3 | Managed social media including planning design and creating content |
| Pathways to Housing | 3 | Collected client testimonials and materials for a health literacy campaign |
| US Dream Academy | 3 | Created learning activity game with instruction manual to be used for leading group activities for youth mentoring program |
Student Scholarship
The following students were selected as Nashman Exemplars at the Fall 2020 Nashman Center's Symposium on Community Engaged Scholarship:
- Briana Anderson and Chava Kornblatt, "Stories of Pathways: Interviews with People Who Have Experienced Homelessness”
- Shoshana Bittker, Kristen Caldwell, Shira Strongin, and Molly Katz, "Jews United for Justice”
- Noah Lindenberg, Lucy Hirsch, Willow Newcomb, Fiona Joseph, and Madeline Bailer, "Equitable Housing and Development Programs in the District."
Student Comments
“Working with the Children’s Defense Fund has been an eye-opening experience since the first day…. When we first presented our plan, [CDF staff] reminded us of many valuable things we had not considered as outsiders to this community, such as how a majority of the Freedom School students are Black but George Washington was a predominantly White university. We had not considered this divide and how some GW students may not be equipped to deal with the issues the Freedom School students may be dealing with. We found that, as outsiders, a better way to navigate the creation of a service plan would be to ask the community what they need before we begin drafting. This was an incredibly valuable lesson and one that I intend to carry with me for the rest of my service career. This aspect of service learning is challenging; our team is incredibly passionate about the goals and mission of the CDF and began brainstorming immediately, but we learned that passion is only a part of what we needed to develop a relevant and impactful project.”
“I realized that it is incredibly important to be informed about those you are serving and that it is our responsibility to ensure that the project created can have the most impact possible and this comes with transferring roles from a project leader to a project facilitator…. Our job is to do whatever we can to make the work of those who are in the community easier but to follow their lead when it comes to the direction the project takes. I have learned an immense amount from working with this project thus far and look forward to continuing to work with the CDF throughout the semester.”
“I learned about taking what we learned in class and from the organization and applying it to our project so that we worked efficiently and independently.”
“I developed better communication skills, both communicating with my group members and communicating with the wonderful people at the organization that we worked with. I learned how to be okay with leaning on my group members when I needed help, and when to step in when one of my group members needed help, and really how it is about balance to get the work done for the project.”
“My experience with the US dream academy has been great, because while working with the organization I have learned that we must be leaders, be communicative, and be patient… My biggest "aha" moment, however, was the realization that this project is beyond a grade…. When I thought of this project as just a grade, it devalued the work of the project. You cannot attach a number/letter grade to a tool that is designed to help other people throughout the community.
Learn more about Community Engaged Scholarship at GW
