1995-1996 Faculty Fellows
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Jean Bush-Bacelis is a Professor of Management in Eastern's College of Business. She teaches both undergraduate and graduate courses in business communication, managerial communication, organizational behavior, international management, intercultural business, and teams in organizations.
Dr. Bush-Bacelis first used academic service-learning in a business communication course (Management 202) in Winter 1996. The course is a skills-oriented class in which students study theory and write letters, memos, proposals, and reports, along with studying oral communication and listening. She adapted assignments to involve academic service-learning. Students located and selected a nonprofit or not-for-profit agency themselves.
In small groups, students wrote a proposal (to limit and clearly define their tasks), a progress report, and a final report. They reported orally to the class periodically and to the organization, "target organization." Students had to produce something tangible and of lasting value for the organization, such as a series of letters soliciting funds, a rewritten operations manual, or a nutritional guide for HIV clients. Dr. Bush-Bacelis continues to use academic service-learning in all classes and welcomes inquiries about her students' activities.
Contact Jean Bush-Bacelis at:
Phone: (734) 487-3445 or 487-3240
Fax: (734) 487-4100
E-mail: Jean.Bush-Bacelis@emich.edu
Polly Buchanan
Polly Buchanan is an Associate Professor teaching food service and hospitality management classes at the undergraduate and graduate level. She teaches both theory and lab classes. The fields of quantity food service and lodging are a natural to academic service-learning in areas such as homeless shelters, soup kitchens, and food recycling programs.
In her course, HM 430 Senior Seminar in Hospitality Management, Dr. Buchanan used the local Food Gatherers organization (county perishable food recycling program) as the primary agency to have students gain community service experience that used their management and leadership skills.
Dr. Buchanan established a course objective that provided students with a real-life situation in which to practice and strengthen their management/leadership skills. Each student spent 40 hours during the semester at Food Gatherers, arranging the hours to fit their individual schedules. They were to identify an operational problem, design several solutions, select the best solution, discuss it with the director for approval, and then implement the solution.
They then analyzed the results of their solution and determined its effectiveness. Each student gave oral presentations about their identified problem and solutions at the end of the semester. Seven juried national presentations resulted from this faculty experience; thus overall a benefit for both students and faculty. Hospitality Management courses offered by Professor Buchanan involving academic service-learning are:
- – 40 hours at Food Gatherers.
- Objective: To become familiar with this agency, the services they offer, their operational challenges, and how students might become involved as a future Hospitality (Restaurant/Hotel) manager.
- Responses: Many were amazed at the amount of activity that occurs daily, how much wasted food occurs in the county, and much more of it would be wasted without the Food Gatherers operation.
- Internship – 30 hours at Food Gatherers for most students; a few worked at other locations of their own choice:
- Objective: To use their management and leadership skills to identify an operational problem and determine an effective solution. With this limited amount of time (in hours and weeks involved), the problems they saw were often small but often significant.
Contact Polly Buchanan at:
Phone: (734) 487-0077
Fax: (734) 487-8536
E-mail: Polly.Buchanan@emich.edu
Chris Foreman is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Communication and Theatre Arts. She teaches both undergraduate and graduate courses in organizational communication, small group communication, communicating in meetings, communicating creatively, and gendered communication. Dr. Foreman incorporates components of academic service-learning into all of her classes, but it is the inclusion of group projects in the Small Group Communication (CTAC 359) classroom where she has seen the highest levels of service and learning.
Groups of five to six students are placed with nonprofit agencies where they are to work with the agency helping them to define and analyze a particular problem. After problem analysis, the groups work to propose and implement solutions. Completed projects have included a bowl-a-thon fund raiser, design and publication of brochures, the development of a campus club, the collecting of data for a database, the design and implementation of a volunteer survey, and assistance in designing an annual report.
Dr. Foreman has also successfully incorporated academic service-learning into her Gender Communication class. Students have been working with a number of local agencies, learning first-hand how communication is "gendered" in organizations. Students work with agencies such as the S.O.S. Crisis Center, Grandparents as Parents, Meals on Wheels, The Women's Center, Ozone House, Senior Center
Centers, and Young Life Leadership.
Winter 1997 academic service-learning groups/projects. Each group is assigned to a different agency to help that agency "solve a particular problem." The following are some of the placements:
Problem: Fundraising
This group organized a bowl-a-thon that was held on March 29th. They have collected all the funds from the various sponsors, with an estimate of raising $500 for the agency
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Problem: Promotional literature
This group prepared two new colorful flyers that the agency can recreate and send to prospective sponsors.
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Problem: Student volunteer retention
This group worked with Student Media Director Paul Heaton to design and circulate a survey that would be completed by student volunteers to help determine the problems with student retention.
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Problem: Employee/volunteer communication
This group helped design a system that the agency could use to track who is in/out at the agency at any particular point in the day. They also sampled different computer programs that could also do this task.
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Problem: Updating the newsletter
This group worked with this agency (one that helps ex-convicts and their families become part of the community after incarceration) revamp their existing newsletter.
Problem: Poor database management
This group helped collect information (by phone and on site) from various disaster shelters to provide data for the Red Cross centralized system.
Contact Chris Foreman at:
Phone: (734) 487-4199
Fax: (734) 487-3443
E-mail: doctalk1@msn.com (the numeral one)
Robert Kraft is a Professor of English and teaches advanced courses in writing for juniors and seniors. One of his courses, called "Writing in the Professional World" provides an academic service-learning opportunity. In this course, students can write informational documents needed by public service and non-profit organizations such as the Red Cross, Meals-on-Wheels, and local museums. These organizations review the documents, print, and then distribute them to the public as needed.
Contact Robert Kraft at:
Phone: (734) 487-4220
Fax: (734) 483-9744
E-mail: robert.kraft@emich.edu
Robert Kreger is a Full Professor of Special Education at Eastern Michigan University specializing in the education and treatment of children and youth with emotional disorders.
Dr. Kreger used academic service-learning in his course SED 301, Theory of Emotional Disturbance in Children and Youth.
Contact Robert Kreger at:
Phone: (734) 487-3300
Fax: (734) 487-2473
E-mail: Rob.Kreger@emich.edu
Kathleen Stacey is an Associate Professor in the Communication and Theatre Arts Department. She teaches Honors Fundamentals of Speech, Interviewing as Communication, as well as undergraduate and graduate Communication Research courses. She uses academic service-learning in her undergraduate research course (CTAC 475) and Interviewing as Communication (CTAC 357).
- Huron Valley Child Guidance Center: Designing, implementing and analyzing a survey for respite care providers and respite care recipients. The information will let the agency know the level of satisfaction and what changes should be made, if any.
- Eastern Echo: Students designed, implemented and analyzed survey data from advertisers, non-advertisers, and EMU undergraduate students. The information gained looked at the satisfaction of each group. The non-advertisers were surveyed to determine why they do no advertise in the Eastern Echo.
- University Health Services group surveyed undergraduate students to determine the demand for counseling services and what type of services students wanted.
- Women's Center-A group surveyed undergraduate students to determine what the students want the Women's Center to do. Also, they wanted to know if students were aware that the Center existed.
- Food Gatherers-A group gathered secondary information about homelessness and hunger at the national and local levels.
Contact Kathleen Stacey at:
Phone: (734) 487-3131
Fax: (734) 487-3443
E-mail: kathleen.stacey@emich.edu
Bill Tucker teaches pedagogy and written Communication in the Department of English Language and Literature. He has been exploring ways to expose pre-practicum students to secondary student writing in two teaching methods courses through academic service-learning.
Since 1995 he has arranged academic service-learning partnerships with Milan High School, Roberto Clemente Development Center, Plymouth-Canton High School, Divine Child High School (Dearborn), Romulus High School, and Holmes Middle School, Livonia.
In Engl 409, Teaching English in the Secondary Schools, the preservice teachers correspond high school students as reading partners. Letter exchanges, book club meetings, and visits to the high schools were featured in these partnerships.
In Engl 408, Writing for Writing Teachers, preservice teachers have exchanged writing with high school and middle school students and participated in a web caucus to discuss their writing samples in response groups. In the latest exchange with Milan High School (Fall, 2000), both classes published their best work in a writing anthology published by the high school class through Chapbooks.com.
In the future these classes will spend more time in secondary classrooms as tutors, supporting classroom teachers, high school writing centers, and community literacy centers. The goal will be to get preservice teachers more involved with secondary students and offer individual support to secondary literacy programs.
Professor Tucker continues to pursue an interest in reflective writing for preservice teachers. In Engl 409 students are writing with real genres and audiences in mind to develop their understanding of students, parents, and supervisors as the audiences of their writing and teaching. Students from Engl 409 will participate in a panel discussion "What Do Teachers Actually Write?" at the 2001 Fall Conference of the National Council of Teachers of English.
Contact Bill Tucker at:
Phone: (734) 487-0279
Fax: (734) 483-9744
E-mail: wtucker@emich.edu
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