Office of Community-Engaged Learning

Formerly known as the Office of Metropolitan Impact (OMI) as of September 2023. Stay tuned for website changes!

The Office of Community-Engaged Learning supports University of Michigan-Dearborn's mission by: An infographic explaining how OCEL can support research, community, administrative, and financial needs
  • Cultivating faculty who are leaders in their disciplines, inspire their students, and care for their students' needs;
  • Creating and sharing pioneering interdisciplinary research that supports diverse sections of our economy, with an emphasis on work that serves the common good;
  • Making lasting local impacts by valuing the experiences, knowledge, needs, and voices of our business and community partners; and
  • Forging mutually beneficial partnerships with businesses, community-based organizations, educational institutions, and government agencies

 

 

 

OCEL's Mission and Vision

Mission

The Office of Community-Engaged Learning (OCEL) is dedicated to supporting the University’s mission of deepening community impact.  The office does this by forging mutually beneficial partnerships between university and community through curricular and aligned co-curricular opportunities.

We at OCEL connect the University to community partners for engaged coursework, research, and service. Our work is prioritized into 3 main buckets: 

  • Supporting Student Success and Retention
  • Supporting Faculty Research, Scholarship, and Service
  • Increasing Community Voice and OCEL’s Visibility on Campus

We achieve this by:

Educating students and faculty on best practices of community engagement, such as classroom workshops and consulting;

Supporting community-engaged academic experiences, such as stewarding the proliferation of CC and CE course attributes;

Building capacity for community engaged faculty scholarship and grant acquisition, through efforts like our annual seed grant program;

Institutionalizing community-engagement on campus, through efforts like maintaining Carnegie Engaged Campus Classification; and

Including community voice in campus decision making, such as hosting a community advisory board and regularly surveying and debriefing with partners.

Vision

Institutionalizing community engagement on campus by valuing the input and experiences of community partners.

OCEL has supported UM-Dearborn in the following ways:

an infographic explaining the different accomplishments OMI has achieved in the past academic year

a metrics report for academic year 2023-2024 indicating the amount of engagement OCEL has facilitated

How To Reach Us

The Office of Community-Engaged Learning will be operating university business on a hybrid basis.

Our in person office hours vary, so please email [email protected] with questions or [email protected] if you need to make an appointment. 

We acknowledge that the University of Michigan resides on the ancestral, traditional, and contemporary lands of the Anishinaabeg – The Three Fire Confederacy of the Ojibwe, Odawa, and Potawatomi Nations, as well as the Wyandot Nation. In particular, the university resides on land gifted by the three Nations and the Wyandot Nation, along with many other Indigenous Nations, in the 1817 Treaty of Fort Meigs. We acknowledge the language of "gift" in the original treaty entails mutual relationships between treaty parties, respect, and obligation on the part of the settlers. We advocate for Indigenous struggles against ongoing settler-colonization and strive for a decolonized future.

Office of Community-Engaged Learning

Suite 1100, First Floor - Ford Collaboratory - Mardigian Library
4901 Evergreen Rd
Dearborn, MI 48128
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