Are you ready to create community partnerships that honour everyone in inclusive and sustainable ways?

For anyone involved in service learning, co-curricular service and global citizenship education, building inclusive and reciprocal community partnerships is key. But often busy educators, service learning coordinators and International Baccalaureate CAS (Creativity/Action/Service) and Service as Action coordinators wonder how to build a deep meaningful partnership or how to evaluate existing partnerships to deepen impact for both student learners and community partners. 


This 6-week course will provide you with the thinking frameworks, resources and strategies you need to evaluate your partnerships, as well as take existing or new partnerships to the next level, a level that honours your educational objectives as well as the assets and needs of your community partners. 


Essential questions for the course include: 

  • What is a reciprocal partnership, and what varieties of partnerships might be part of your Service Learning, CAS, Service as Action or Global Citizenship program?
  • How can language play a role in building reciprocal, equitable and inclusive partnerships? How can we avoid language and thinking that perpetuates unequal power paradigms (such as “helper/helped” and “server/served”)?
  • How can we create school cultures where service partners participate equally in planning, sharing stories, engaging in listening experiences, and celebrating successes?
  • How can we create new partnerships that are equitable, redesign existing partnerships so they are more inclusive, and/or work with an organization to connect sustainably with a new community? 
  • What protocols, essential agreements and common understandings can be used to create and sustain reciprocal community partnerships?