CEL Conference

Collective Leadership in Complex Times: Reimagining Community-Engaged Change (Room 101)

In an era characterized by complexity, uncertainty, and deeply rooted social and environmental challenges, no single leader, institution, or discipline can create meaningful change in isolation. This talk will explore how collective leadership and community engagement, when put into conversation with each other, can help us navigate such complexity and work towards more peaceful, just, and sustainable futures.

Keynote speaker: Dr. Haden M. Botkin is an Assistant Professor of Organizational & Community Leadership in the Agricultural Leadership, Education, and Communications (ALEC) program at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. His research addresses questions of how community-campus partnerships create conditions for collective leadership and systems change. His recent research has appeared in publications such as the International Journal of Research on Service-Learning and Community Engagement, Michigan Journal of Community Service Learning, and Journal of Agricultural Education. Haden completed his Ph.D. in Human Sciences and Leadership Studies at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln in 2025.

Centering a Community Garden Project: Promoting Student-Engaged Learning through Participatory Design for All (Room 101)

We will share how the IU Center for Rural Engagement supported a partnership with the Orange County Community Gardens in Paoli, Indiana to develop a student-engaged learning course.

Presenter(s): Rebecca (Becca) Lassell, Pezhman Raeisian Parvari

Department(s): Health & Wellness Design, School of Public Health

Global Community Engaged Learning: Institutional Support and Case Studies from Education and Public Health (Room 122)

We’ll share an overview of the structure and goals of the Global Community Engaged Learning Course Development Institute for IU faculty as well as two case studies from faculty fellows: a teacher education course and a 300-level Global Health Promotion course.

Presenter(s): Eli Konwest, Laura B. Liu, Julia Sherry

Department(s): IU Center for the Study of Global Change, IUC Division of Education, IUB School of Public Health

Community-Engaged Learning for Access to Justice: The Applied Research Practicum Model (Room 222)

We examine the Applied Research Practicum (ARP), an interdisciplinary course at Indiana University created to expand access to civil legal services through regulatory innovation, including a new tier of legal service providers and the development of a sliding-scale nonprofit law firm model.

Presenter(s): Bella Bennett, Angie Raymond

Department(s): Indiana University Maurer School of Law, Indiana University Kelley School of Business

4Cs of Public Health Teaching: Translating Maternal and Child Health Research into Community Engaged Learning (Room 101)

We propose a 4Cs Framework for Public Health Teaching: contemporary relevance, collaboration, co-agency, and community, to guide the design of classroom activities that connect academic learning with community needs and application.

Presenter(s): Angela Chow, Angie Wong

Department(s): Department of Applied Health Science

Writing for the Public Good: Fostering Civic Development with Community-Engaged Business Communication (Room 122)

We examine a community-engaged business communication project that partners students with the City of Bloomington Volunteer Network (BVN) to support local nonprofit outreach efforts.

Presenter(s): Xin Chen

Department(s): Communication and Professional Skills, Kelley School of Business

From Classroom Pitch to Community Impact: A First-Year Consulting Partnership with a Local Cat Café (Room 222)

We highlight a year-long collaboration between a first-year business presentations course at Indiana University Bloomington and Btown Meow Cat Café. Students developed short persuasive presentations using Monroe’s Motivated Sequence to propose research-supported solutions to real challenges facing the café.

Presenter(s): Benjamin Ale-Ebrahim, Amber Moore

Department(s): Kelley School of Business, Btown Meow Cat Cafe

Civic Learning in Community Engaged Classrooms (Room 101)

How can instructors move beyond service-learning to foster intentional civic agency? Seven instructors from a cross-disciplinary Faculty Learning Community tussled with this question and share an approach to classroom engagement with civic learning.

Presenter(s): Scott Burgins, Kathryn Engebretson, Lessie Frazier, Christina Boyles, Rebecca Butorac, Mark Fraley, Heather Eastman-Mueller

Department(s): O’Neill, Education, Political Science, Luddy ILS, Kelley, PACE, Public Health

Creating a Community Engaged and Experiential Learning Project Within a 100+ Student Course (Room 122)

We highlight how to create a scalable experiential learning project in a large-enrollment (100-plus-student) course, through the design and implementation of a meaningful, low-impact community-engaged learning (CEL) experience within an introductory course—V161: Urban Problems and Solutions.

Presenter(s): Mitch Berg

Department(s): O'Neill School of Public and Environmental Affairs

Community-Engaged Learning for K-12 Outreach: Developing a Graduate-level Biology Course (Room 222)

Community-engaged learning is rare at the graduate level, despite significant interest by graduate students and repeated calls for graduate-level CEL models. This session shares the motivation, process, and developing syllabus for an IU Biology graduate community-engaged learning course built around K-12 outreach with Biology’s Outreach office.

Presenter(s): Heather Reynolds

Department(s): College/Biology/Biology K-12 Outreach