Changing Campus Culture Through Civil Discourse
The Campuswide Immersion initiative (CWI) aims to improve campus dialogue and collaboration by supporting the creation of campus cultures in which all undergraduate students appreciate, learn, and practice civil discourse skills during their time at school. Led by Citizens & Scholars, CWI supports higher education institutions in convening faculty, staff, and students to create action plans and curricular and co-curricular interventions aimed at equipping students with the essential skills for effective citizenship.
Citizens & Scholars is breaking new ground with CWI—no other group of higher ed institutions has committed to simultaneously addressing civil discourse on campus with a common planning approach and set of shared outcomes. This unique, highly collaborative initiative aims at directly transforming campus culture and advancing how higher ed fosters civil discourse.
Campuses Can Be Vibrant Hubs of Citizen Development
Benefits
- Gain hands-on support and thought partnership in developing a tailored action plan to meet your institution’s unique educational and cultural needs and opportunities.
- Receive dedicated project management services, with Citizens & Scholars catalyzing internal collaboration and serving as your accountability partner to help accelerate progress.
- Access a Citizens & Scholars Catalog of Interventions, Action Plan template, Evaluation template and other key resources to guide the design of your campuswide activities and programs.
- Leverage our deep expertise and tools, along with insights into the broader landscape of civic education and potential partners.
- Engage in collaboration and learning opportunities with peer institutions through in-person and virtual convenings with your cohort.
- Utilize a unified approach to measuring success and demonstrating impact.
- Ensure campuswide support for the initiative through a process that fosters buy-in from faculty, staff, and students.
Your Commitment
- Develop and submit a comprehensive action plan with a vision, strategy, and multiple targeted interventions to reach every undergraduate student.
- Assemble an Action Council of faculty, staff, and students to guide implementation and align evaluation with our measurement standards, appointing a lead to oversee progress and coordination.
- Agree to and participate in a shared evaluation approach to assess individual and collective impact and learnings.
- Provide resources to support the execution of the recommended programming initiatives.
Learn more about Campuswide Immersion by emailing immersion@collegepresidents.org
Participating Campuses
Participating campuses all have a shared goal: transform campus culture in 2–5 years by engaging every student in multiple opportunities to learn and practice civil discourse. The following institutions are currently participating in Campuswide Immersion:
American University
Benedict College
Claremont McKenna College
Colorado College
Dartmouth College
Delta College
Denison University
DePauw University
Duke University
Fordham University
Howard University
James Madison University
Macalester College
Montclair State University
Ohio Wesleyan University
Otterbein University
Rollins College
Rutgers University
Skidmore College
Towson University
University of Denver
University of Nebraska at Omaha
University of Pittsburgh
University of Richmond
University of Wisconsin-Madison
Wellesley College
Wesleyan University
College Presidents for Civic Preparedness is a phenomenal, brilliant, and supportive group of smart people who are highly collaborative and deeply committed to advancing the free exchange of ideas, civic participation and democracy.
Roslyn Clark Artis
President of Benedict College