Community Partner Resources

The Office of Community-Engaged Learning (OCEL) is your connection to innovative engagement for the University and our surrounding community.  Through strategic community partnering, research opportunities, programming opportunities, paid and unpaid internships and work-study opportunities, university faculty and students are helping to co-create tomorrow’s greater Detroit – today.  OCEL is here to help community partners identify UM-Dearborn campus resources that best address their needs.  

A community dialogue as part of the Art and Agency: Taking it to the Street workshop series.

An installment of Alleys, Lots, and Hubs as part of the University of Michigan Engage Detroit Workshop Series 2023.

A year of wonderful Art and Agency Workshops will culminate in a celebratory art exhibit featuring poetry and art from justice-impacted individuals. Contact Penny Kane (plkane@umich.edu) for questions!

Engaged faculty member, Dr. DeLean Tolbert Smith, is holding weekly "Inventing History" classes at the Henry Ford Museum for 6th graders and their parents! This offering is made possible through collaboration between DAPCEP, the Henry Ford Museum, and University of Michigan-Dearborn.

Participants will celebrate Black inventors, learn about the design process, and use STEM skills to create an invention!

Use the QR code or click this link to register by February 1st, 2023!

(above: Dr. Tolbert-Smith presenting to a 6th grade science class at University Prep Academy Middle School)

(right: a flyer for "Inventing History")

Geographic Information Systems (GIS) let you visualize, question, analyze, interpret, and understand data to reveal spatial relationships, patterns, and trends, which in turn help to inform organizational policy and decision making. GIS technology is also particularly informative for asset mapping, needs assessments, and visualizing equity issues.

One of the many ways that the Office of Community Engaged Learning supports community partners is by connecting them to GIS technology.  The office works to increase GIS Academic Service Learning courses, support GIS student group projects, and place student GIS internships within community organizations.