Community Engaged Learning Reflection
1. Did engaging with your community partner help you to learn more about the subject areas
covered in this community engaged learning course? If so, how? If not, why not?
Yes immensely. While corresponding with my community partners they consistently shared
how they live their daily lives on the inside and through their experiences, insights, and
testimonies. I was able to become aware, informed and educated of the reality of our flawed
criminal justice system. Their dehumanizing stories helped me see a whole new perspective
that I was never aware of, I realized how neglectful our prison system is.
2. As a result of your community engaged learning course and experience, have you expanded
your understanding of the communities and cultures you encountered? Was there a specific
encounter that impacted your thinking the most? Please explain.
Yes, before I started this course, I used to be oblivious to the community that is on the inside
and the critical issues with mass incarceration. I used to think people like my community
partners deserved to be living inside for many years and to be punished but after getting to
know some of them and personally hearing the testimonies of two of them in our class really
opened my eyes to see that they are deserving of a better life and opportunities.
3. Has participating in this community engaged learning course and engaging with your
community partner helped you to identify involvement in the community as a personal or
professional priority? In what ways?
Yes, personally I have felt a great responsibility and commitment to get more involved with
these specific communities and finding ways to advocate and provide awareness of these
issues causing harm to them. I have personally gained a desire to get more informed and
involved with campaigns and that can help them.
4. Has participating in this community engaged learning experience helped you to feel more
confident that you can work with others to make a difference in the world around
you? Please explain.
Yes, it has greatly boosted my confidence and potential to interact, get involved and talk to
others about important issues that need to be addressed and followed. I feel like I have gained
more resources as well and a supporting community that can help guide me to make a
change.
5. At the beginning of the semester, you were introduced to key dispositions for entry into
community-engaged work. These included: humility, empathy, commitment, openmindedness, intellectual curiosity, and an awareness of community cultural wealth. How do
you think you have developed or taken on these dispositions in your own CEL experience?
I think I have been able to implement these dispositions when talking to my community
partners and throughout the course when learning about all the different issues that I had no
knowledge of. I practiced empathy when writing to my correspondents, open-mindedness
when hearing different opinions from what I was used to and awareness of community
culture health wealth by trying to get more involved with ways to help people and inform
others of these critical issues.