Philadelphia Higher Education Network for Neighborhood Development 
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History 208: Penn Program for Public Service Internship

Faculty: Cory Bowman, bowman@pobox.upenn.edu
Eric Chen,
Ira Harkavy, harkavy@pobox.upenn.edu
Deirdra Stockmann, deridra@sas.upenn.edu

Subject/Discipline: 
School: University of Pennsylvania
Project Area:

Summer 2003



Working Title: Faculty-Student Collaborative Seminar on Creating an Integrated, Problem-Solving, Democratic Schooling System: Penn and West Philadelphia Public Schools as an Experiment in Progress

(provisional syllabus; to be developed as the seminar progresses)

Monday, June 2:    Introduction to the Seminar
Readings for discussion:
Bok, D. “Universities and the Decline of Civic Responsibility.” Journal of College and Character. (February, 2001)
Fish, S. “Aim Low: Confusing democratic values with academic ones can easily damage the quality of education” Chronicle of Higher Education. (May 16, 2003)

Assignment for next class:
1)    Write a 3-5 page autobiography. Who are you? How does who you are influence what you care about? How does what you care about influence who you are?
2)    What are the three problems you care most passionately about in the West Philadelphia-Penn community?
3)    Why do you care about them?
4)    Choose one or two passages from the reading that stood out to you, that you would like more information about, that would like to discuss further, etc.

Wednesday, June 4    History of Penn-West Philadelphia Relationship, WEPIC, and the Center for community Partnerships.
Readings for discussion:
Astin, A. “Liberal Education and Democracy: The Case for Pragmatism.”
Benson, L & Harkavy, I. Selections from: “The Role of the American Research University in Advancing System-Wide Education Reform, Democratic Schooling, and Democracy.” (Brabeck, 2003).
--- . “De-Platonizing and Democratizing Education as the Bases of Service Learning.” (Rhoades, 1997)
Harkavy, I, Puckett, J and Romer, D. “Action Research: Bridging Service and Research. (Michigan Journal of Community Service Learning, 2000).
Harkavy, I. “Honoring Community.” (Campus Compact Reader, Fall, 2002)

Problem Solving Learning Framework
Assignment for next class:
1)    Choose the problem that you think you would like to concentrate on this summer. (Don’t worry, this is not “set in stone.”)
2)    Complete the PSL through 1.6 individually
3)    At the house, share problems with each other. Identify a few other interns who are interested in working on RELATED “problems.”
4)    Choose one or two passages from the reading that stood out to you, that you would like more information about, that would like to discuss further, etc.

Monday, June 9    University-Assisted Community Schools
Readings for discussion:
Benson, L & Harkavy, I. “Truly Engaged and Truly Democratic Cosmopolitan Civic Universities, Community Schools, And Development Of The Democratic Good Society in the 21st Century” (Sept, 2002)
Harkavy, I., Benson, L. “University-Assisted Community Schools as Democratic Public Works” The Good Society (1999).
Dewey, J.  School as Social Centre.Puckett, J. A Public Place, A Public Purpose: Leonard Covello and the American Community School. Introduction, Chapter 1, Chapter 12. (DRAFT, July 2002).

Assignment for next class:
1)    In groups, or individually, continue to develop your PSL, through step 3.
2)    Choose one or two passages from the reading that stood out to you, that you would like more information about, that would like to discuss further, etc.

Wednesday, June 11    Building Collaborative Partnerships: Penn and West Philadelphia
Readings for discussion:
Gamson, Z. “Collaborative Learning Comes of Age”
Harkavy, I. and Brown.  “Making the Connection.”Rodin, J. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day speech. (January, 2000). “
Muzafer Sherif: A life of conflict and goals; for more than 50 years, his innovative research has helped share the history of psychology.” (Psychology Today, Sept 1985 v19 p54(6))

Assignments for next class:
1)    To be determined
2)    Choose one or two passages from the reading that stood out to you, that you would like more information about, that would like to discuss further, etc.

Monday, June 16    Overview of the Center for Community Partnerships: Programs and Development, Successes and Failures
Readings:
Eisenberg, E. “Improving Undergraduate Education by Improving West Philadelphia Schools: Penn’s America Reads Program at Drew Elementary School as a Case Study.” (paper for Urban Studies 078, Spring 1999)
Gilfillan, S & Green, S. “Student Apathy and Community Space.”  (paper for History 214, Spring 2003)
Rubin, B. “Reconstructing Higher Education: Defining the Obstacles, Penn as a Case Study.” (paper for History 214, Spring 1998)“West Philadelphia Community – Penn Partnership To Improve Heath Related Quality of Life for Children and Families” (Draft April, 2003)

Assignment for next class:

Wednesday, June 18    Problem-based Learning and Problem-Solving Learning: What does it look like in practice?
Readings for discussion:
Coleman, W. “Self-directed Problem-based Learning in Mainstream Undergraduate Courses.” (PBL Insight, v2n3, Fall 1999)
Harkavy, I. Forward to Jacoby, B. Building Partnerships for Service-Learning.
Heckman, P. “Planting Seeds: Understanding Through Investigation.” (Educational Leadership, Feb., 1994)
Long, E.L. Higher Education as a Moral Enterprise. (1992) Prologue, Ch. 1, Ch. 14.
Nicholls, J & Hazzard, S. “Students as Collaborators in Curriculum Construction.” In Nicholls, J. & Thorkildsen, T., eds. Reasons for Learning: Expanding the Conversation on student-teacher collaboration.

Assignment for next class:
1)    Complete PSL as much as possible.
2)    Compile a short bibliography of useful resources to share with the class.

Monday, June 23    Democracy
Readings for discussion:
Beetham, D, Bracking, S, Kearon, I & Weir, S. International Handbook on Democracy Assessment. (Kliwer Law International, 2002)
Carr, W. “The Curriculum in and for a Democratic Society.” (Curriculum Studies, v6, n3, 1998)Colby, A, Ehrlich, T. “Educating Citizens.” (2003) (excerpts: Preface, Chapter 1, Chapter 10.)
Dewey, J. “Creative Democracy – The Task Before Us.” (excerpt from Morris, D. and Shapiro, I. John Dewey: The Political Writings.)“Education for Citizenship in Scotland: A paper for Discussion and Development.” (June, 2002).National Society for Experiential Education. “Foundations of Experimental Education.” (Dec. 1997)

Assignment for Wednesday:
1)    Ponder the democracy questions, including: What does it matter to have a democratic society? What is a democratic society? What is the current state of democracy in America? Why does democratic education matter for democratic society? How do you change education? What would democractic education look like if you stepped into it?
2)    WRITE a short mid-course evaluation considering the following: What works in seminar? What has not worked? What should we do in seminar for the next several weeks? Who needs to do what to make that happen?

Wednesday, June 25    Mid-summer review, assessment and planning
For discussion:Assignment from Monday. (see above)Assignments for next week:
1) Review, revise, and try to complete your PSL. Incorporate feedback and additional research. EMAIL your PSLs to Cory and Deirdra BEFORE (preferably the day before) our meetings on Monday.

Monday, June 30    Small group meetings/PSL workshops with Cory and Deirdra, (4:30-6:30)

Wednesday, July 2    Small group meetings/PSL workshops (3:00-4:30)
Seminar – Topics determined by the interns

Readings for discussion:
Caffrey, M., et al. Reducing Apathy at the University of Pennsylvania. (Paper for seminar, Spring 2003.)
Heckman, P., Confer C. & Peacock, J. “Democracy in a Multicultural School and Community.”
Heckman, P. “A Proposal for a Study of the Democratic Features of Elementary, Secondary, Undergraduate, and Teacher Education Programs in the U.S.”
Sorenson, K. “Creating a Democratic Classroom: Empowering Students Within and Outside School Walls.”

Assignment for Monday meetings:

Monday, July 7    Small group meetings/PSL workshops with Cory and Deirdra, (4:30-6:30)

Wednesday, July 9    Small group meetings/PSL workshops (3:00-4:30)
Seminar – Group led discussions-    Sayre HPDP (Ruth, Aalok)-    Urban Fitness (Shannon, Heather)-    Shaw Project Health (Lilia)Readings for discussion:

Assignment for Monday meetings:

Monday, July 14    Small group meetings/PSL workshops with Cory and Deirdra, (4:30-6:30)

Wednesday, July 16    Small group meetings/PSL workshops (3:00-4:30)
Seminar – Group led discussions-    School to Career (Muriel, MaryBeth, Lynne)-    Journalism (Naomi, Anjali)

Readings for discussion:

Assignment for Monday meetings:

Monday, July 21    Small group meetings/PSL workshops with Cory and Deirdra, (4:30-6:30)

Thursday, July 24* rescheduled for Dr. Harkavy’s return!    Small group meetings/PSL workshops (3:00-4:30)
Seminar – Group led discussion-    Arts in Education (Missy, Maricarmen, Jackie, Candy, Nicole)-    Sayre-Beacon Community School (Chris)-    All groups briefly update Dr. Harkavy-    Dr. Harkavy update
Readings for discussion:

Assignment for Monday meetings

Monday, July 28    Small group meetings/PSL workshops with Cory and Deirdra, (4:30-6:30)

Wednesday, July 30    Small group meetings/PSL workshops (3:00-4:30)
Seminar – Group led discussions-    Partnerships with the Muslim community (Zaid)-    Creating community space (Jooho)
Readings for discussion:

Assignment for Monday meetings

Monday, August 4    Small group meetings/PSL workshops with Cory and Deirdra, (4:30-6:30)

Wednesday, August 6    Small group meetings/PSL workshops (3:00-4:30)
Seminar – To be determined by seminar
Readings for discussion:

Assignment for Monday meetings

Monday, August 11    Small group meetings/Final paper advising

Wednesday, August 13    LAST SEMINAR – Evaluation and next steps
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