About

Values

Reflection and Learning 
We believe it is everyone’s responsibility to always be learning about our world and ourselves. We advocate for reflective practice as a way of charting the course of our individual lives, and as well as for understanding the roots and realities of our deeply unequal society and identifying ways we can use our skills, talents, and passions for a better future.

Justice and Equity 
We believe the deep and persistent inequalities in our society are systemic, structural, and rooted in history. We are motivated by a sense of urgency to name and challenge those inequalities in our effort to build a more just and equitable world through social change.

Empathy and Compassion 
In addition to learning from our own experiences, we strive to understand lived experiences that differ from our own. We aim to uncover our biases and stereotypes, while cultivating empathy and compassion for those who do not benefit from our current social structures and systems.

Authentic and Reciprocal Relationships 
We believe authentic relationships are rooted in mutual growth and shared benefit and are centered on honest feedback and a willingness to be vulnerable. We strive to address interpersonal and institutional power imbalances and recognize both individual and community strengths. 

Connectedness, Care and Belonging 
We believe in the power of connectedness, care, and belonging. As individuals, we are members of many communities, both on and off-campus. We believe that community engagement has the potential to transform our individual and our collective well-being.

Commitment to Equity

Equity Statement
The Center for Community-Engaged Learning (CCEL) is committed to centering equity in community-engaged work to realize more equitable communities. For the CCEL, effective community engagement entails both understanding and disrupting systemic inequities. We recognize that these inequities have and continue to pervade our community and continue to cause inherent harm to all of us. We believe that equity is everyone's responsibility. We are all engaged in a lifelong process of learning and growth. 

Land Acknowledgement Statement
The Center for Community-Engaged Learning acknowledges that the University of Minnesota - Twin Cities occupies lands included in 1805, 1837, and 1851 treaties between the United States government and the sovereign Dakota nation. Due to the U.S. government's failure to uphold any of these treaties, these lands still rightfully and legally belong to the Dakota people. The Dakota are the only people indigenous to this place, and they have maintained a spiritual connection to and physical presence in it throughout history to the present day as part of the Twin Cities' large and vibrant Native American community.

Land Acknowledgement Purpose
We have two main reasons for making this statement. First, as members of a scholarly community dedicated to furthering knowledge, we recognize an obligation to know the history of our own institution, and of the geographical area in which we are situated. Second, as practitioners and advocates of community engagement, we see the events of the past continuing to play out today in the vast racial inequities plaguing our state in every issue our work addresses - housing, health, education, environmental quality, and more. Knowing Minnesota's colonial history can help deepen our understanding of systemic racism and historical trauma as root causes of current social realities, enabling us to more effectively work for greater equity.

What We Do

• Community-engaged learning classes: CCEL supports academic courses across all colleges and departments that require or have an option to complete a hands-on project or project-based work within the community. This opportunity supports real-world experience and exploration and provides additional context to academic coursework.
• Volunteer resources: CCEL is partnered with organizations all across the Twin Cities metro and offers U of M members with resources and advising for how to get involved.
• Community Engagement Scholars Program (CESP): The CCEL coordinates the Community Engagement Scholars Program, which provides recognition for undergraduate students' work within the community. This multifaceted program helps guide students in making meaningful contributions to local communities, compliments their undergraduate education and provides a transcript notation when they graduate.
• National Student Exchange: National Student Exchange (NSE) is another experiential education nonprofit hosted within the CCEL. NSE provides the opportunity to study away for a semester or an academic year at one of the 170 member institutions throughout the United States, Canada, and U.S. territories including Puerto Rico, Guam, and the U.S. Virgin Islands