Carleton College: Academic Civic Engagement: Past Course Offerings

Past Course Offerings

Spring '12

Advanced Ceramics - ARTS 330 - Kelly Connole (12 students)

Students in this art course will create over 500 bowls for a yearly event to highlight the problems that hunger creates in society. The event is called Empty Bowls and includes a fundraiser selling the handmade bowls with soup provided by the Carleton community for the Northfield Food Shelf. Students will do research and design publicity based on hunger in a local context in collaboration with the Northfield Community Action Center. Bowls are a fundamental skill in the field of ceramics and the bowls that students made for the event were designed as tokens to remind participants to give back.

Plant Biology - BIOL 236 - Susan Singer (31 students)

Both the Northfield School District and Prairie Creek, a local Charter school, have made substantial changes in their school lunch programs to emphasize healthy food choices and local food sources. Students in this course will study the nutritional effects of various plant-based lunches, and will create trading cards to teach students about healthy snacking.

Topics in Virology - BIOL 370 - Debby Walser-Kuntz (19 students)

The course will focus on the most recent developments in HIV-related research, including implications for HIV-treatment and vaccines and the impact of viral infection on the immune system of the host. Students will work on one of three projects. One group will meet with Northfield and Faribault high school students interested in medical careers and organize a career event for them. Another group will work with the Gender and Sexuality Center to develop educational materials, and another will partner with Daniel Groll's Bioethics class to prepare a presentation on ethical issues in mother-child transmission of AIDS and refusal of medication.

Classical Mythology - CLAS 111 - Clara Hardy (3 of 31 students)

We will study a selection of the most famous Classical myths through close reading of Homer, the Greek tragedians, Ovid and other ancient sources. In addition we'll discuss the most prominent of modern modes of myth interpretation, in an attempt to determine how myth speak - both to the ancient world and to us. The course's civic engagement component will involve working with local 4th and 5th graders.

Teaching Reading in the Content Areas - EDUC 386 - Cathy Oehmke (3 students)

The course provides a theoretical and practical foundation for helping secondary teachers learn to provide specific instructional support for secondary readers. The course will cover instruction in phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, and text comprehension. Students for this class will partner with students from the Prairie Creek Community School to work on reading skills.

Senior Seminar - EDUC 395 - Anita Chikkatur (11 students)

This is a research and design seminar for educational studies concentrators. It focuses on a contemporary issue in American education. Recent seminars have been on educational reform and reformers, service learning, literacy leaders in education, education and the emotions, and personal essays about education. Some off campus work with public school students and teachers is an integral part of the seminar. The academic civic engagement component for this class will focus on charter schools.

Environmental Law and Policy - ENTS 310 - Kim Smith (5 of 15 students)

This seminar will examine topical issues in domestic and international environmental law and policy. Students will aim to understand how environmental laws work to achieve policy objectives, with attention also to debates about the role of markets and community-based environmental management. This year, students will be looking at a policy analysis of the Ames Mill Dam in downtown Northfield. They will examine the current environmental issues surrounding the dam as well as its history.

The French Art of Living: Tradition, Myth, Reality - FREN 349 - Cathy Yandell (22 students)

Through literature, art, architecture, and theory, students will explore French notions of what it means to live well, from Renaissance sumptuousness to existentialist questioning to the depiction of immigrants’ lives in contemporary Paris. The program will examine the ways in which the physical environment fashions attitudes and practices that define the good life (urban and rural settings, the north and the south, housing projects and seascapes). Whenever possible, course readings and student writing will be linked with experiential learning in Paris and southern France. Students will volunteer in the banlieux (primarily diverse low income school districts) of Paris.

Introduction to Statistics - MATH 215 - Bob Dobrow (55 students total, 2 sections, 4 students did additional independent study projects)

Students will analyze member surveys of satisfaction and interest in Northfield Senior Center. Practical aspects of statistics, including extensive use of statistical software, interpretation and communication of results, will be emphasized. Topics include: exploratory data analysis, correlation and linear regression, design of experiments, basic probability, the normal distribution, sampling distributions, estimation, hypothesis testing, and two-way tables.

Place, Politics, and Citizen Mobilization - POSC 209- Pat Cavanaugh (11 students)

This class will explore concepts of democracy, power, identity, and sense of place as we examine cases of citizen mobilization. The class will research a current case study of an environmental controversy that gave rise to citizen mobilization. Some students will look at the Wind Farm proposals in Red Wing, Minnesota and their impact on endangered species in that area. The class will examine the conflicting views of different environmental organizations. Another group will research in depth the political backgrounds of five different foods and prepare materials for tabling in Sayles to educate students on the political impact of these foods.

Language and Deception - PSYC 375 - Mija Van Der Wege (9 students)

In this course, students participate in the development of a local episode of Mental Engineering, a television program based in the Twin Cities that brings together academics and commentators to analyze advertisements. This year, the Carleton students will work in three groups to prepare for and perform a mock episode of Mental Engineering, to be hosted by the host of Mental Engineering, John Forde. Two of the performances will be done with students from The Key, a local youth center. The project enables students to apply insights that they have developed from course material to an analysis of advertisements.

Law, Religion, Morality - RELG 275 - Terrance Wiley (27 students)

This course examined normative and descriptive accounts of the law, particularly in relation to politics, morality, and religion. Students researched juvenile justice for the New York based think tank The Center for NuLeadership on Urban Solutions.

Global Religions in Minnesota - RELG 289 - Shanna Sippy (10 students)

This course examined how global religions adapt to and transform the disparate local communities where their practitioners make home. Students supplemented historical and theoretical instruction with hands-on research with living communities in Minnesota including Muslims in Faribault, Hindus in Eagan, and Cambodian Buddhists in Hampton. The studies and experiences may be published online.

Ethics of Civic Engagement - SOAN 285 - Adrienne Falcón (19 students)

In this course, students will discuss the ethical questions that arise when they engage with others in research, service, organizing, or policy work. Students will read and talk about the meanings and forms of civic engagement and use these readings to reflect upon their own research or service projects. Gaining insights from sociological and practice based readings, we will examine different perspectives on the ways that power and privilege relate to civic engagement. Each student will take on a project based on their own interests.

Methods of Social Research - SOAN 240 - Annette Nierobisz (13 students)

The course is concerned with social scientific inquiry and explanation, particularly with reference to sociology and anthropology. Topics covered include research design, data collection, and analysis of data. Both quantitative and qualitative methods are considered. Student will demonstrate their knowledge by developing a research proposal that is implementable. The class will partner with the Northfield Downtown Development Corporation and partake in interviews examining the direction of development in the downtown area. The class will also interview Carleton alumni currently living in town about the state of Northfield's "knowledge-based economy" and through examining quantitative data they will compile a presentation on the subject.

Washington D.C.: A Global Conversation (2 courses) - POSC 288/289 - Greg Marfleet (22 students -off campus)

Students will participate in a seminar involving meetings with leading Washington figures in areas of global policy making and regular discussions of related readings. Barbara and Greg will take students to Washington DC where they will be doing internships with DC policy organizations.Students will engage with leading scholars and practitioners in the field of political communication to learn how mass media, particularly TV news, influences politics. We will be especially attentive to United States news coverage of international events in new and old media and its importance in international relations, domestic perceptions of global political concerns (e.g. climate change and universal declarations of human rights). Our seminar readings will draw on research in political psychology and democratic theory.

Winter '12

Ireland: The Origin of the Troubles - HIST 245 - Susannah Ottoway (21 students)

This course examines the roots religious and political tensions and violence in modern Irish history, focusing on Anglo-Irish relations. Students will share their research by giving presentations and timelines to Northfield High School's World History classes.

Performing Politics - DANC 255 - Stuart Pimsler (15 students)

This course focuses on individual identity and community-based art, using movement, theater, writing, and voice to explore how politically influenced performance art. Students in this class perform regularly, and will participate in a final performance open to the public. The course will also hold several community workshops in Faribault, one with high school students and another with diabetes patients.

Introduction to Peace Studies - SOAN 236 - Nader Saiedi (25 students)

Peace studies is an interdisciplinary exploration of how harmony and violence function collectively. With an appreciation of the various understandings of peace, this course will study the relationship of peace to modernity, the state, cultural violence, religion, patriarchy, militarism, and much more. Students will have the option of participating in a weekend-long workshop at Carleton facilitated by the Alternatives to Violence Project (AVP), a Quaker initiative focused on creating peaceful spaces and relationships, particularly in prisons, where the project was started by inmates. After completing the training, students will write a reflective essay on their experience and how it informed their understandings of the concepts discussed in class.

Anthropology of Health and Illness - SOAN 262 - Pamela Feldman-Savelsberg (8 of 23 students)

In this course students partnered with HealthFinders and Growing Up Healthy. Students working with Growing Up Healthy conducted library-based research to better understand specific subpopulations (such as the Somali population in Faribault) and specific issues (such as refugee mental health, or culturally specific presentation of symptoms) of relevance to GUH's goals. Those working with HealthFinders helped developed and administered surveys to English and Spanish speakers. Students also organized and led focus groups and did participant observation of waiting rooms.

Field Investigation in Comparative Agroecology - ENTS 261 - David Hougen-Eitzman (12 students)

This course succeeds a two-week visit to China over winter break, where students studied leaders in China's emerging sustainable agriculture movement. Site research included visits to Chinese farms and conversations with sustainable agriculture researchers. This term, the class will develop a curriculum for a variety of age groups of elementary school students. The curriculum will focus on discussing the basics of and differences between agriculture in the US and China. Hands-on activities will be used, including growing squash plants under different nutrient treatments.

Multicultural Education - EDUC 238 - Anita Chikkatur (4 of 25 students)

This class explores theories and strategies for how to teach and learn in a way that respects differences of race, culture, social class, gender, and sexuality. A small group of students in this class will participate in a project to interview Somali parents in Faribault about their views on early childhood education.

Human Reproduction and Sexuality - BIOL 101 - Matt Rand (35 students)

Countering widespread misconceptions about sexuality, this class studies the biology of sex to better understand many aspects of the reproductive process. Participants in this course will work with different groups of local public school students, from elementary to high school ages. Project topics will range from movies to state sex education standards.

Immunology - BIOL 310 - Debby Walser-Kuntz (35 students)

Students will become familiar with the immunology-related primary literature and apply course concepts to real-world problems. Groups will explore one of the following topics in depth: asthma and air pollution, type 2 diabetes and the role of the immune system, or exercise and immunity. Each topic represents an active area of immunology research and a public health issue that can be explored in our local community. Students in the course will write a research paper that requires analysis and synthesis of experimental evidence. Simultaneously, they will also gather and analyze data from the community--including interviews and discussions with their community partners--to gain practical information related to their topic. In collaboration with the community partners, the students will develop a finished product to be used by their community partner.

Statistics: Concepts and Applications - MATH 215.01 and 215.02 - Katie St. Clair (64 students)

This course emphasizes helping students interpret statistical information. The class focused on a statistical problem of the Northfield Senior Center's wish to survey 50- and 60-year-olds about their needs from the senior center and their decision to participate in the senior center. After using this example as a thought experiment, the class shared their findings with the Northfield Senior Center.

Winter Independent Studies: TORCH PSEO, SCOPE, Northfield Senior Center

Independent studies with ACE components include students serving as teaching assistants for high schoolers from TORCH taking online college courses, working as interns in the middle school's SCOPE history enrichment program, and supporting the Northfield Senior Center in designing a questionnaire to meet the needs of local seniors.

Fall '11

Audio Workshop - CAMS 275 - John Schott (16 students)

Geology of Soils - GEOL 258 - Mary Savina (20 students)

Statistics: Concepts and Applications - MATH 115 - Katie St. Clair (23 students)

Experimental Economics - ECON 266 - Lauren Feiler (8 students)

In this course, students will learn how experiments can test and improve economic theory. In addition to studying a range of experimental research, students will create their own economic experiments. The course's civic engagement component centers on a partnership with Be The Match, a national marrow donation registry. Students' goal will be to develop an economic understanding of the decision to donate bone marrow.

Cognitive Development in Middle Childhood - CGSC 385 - Kathy Galotti (11 students)

Memory, perception, attention, problem-solving, and conceptual thinking are all developing rapidly between the ages of 6 and 11. This course will study how academic and social contexts can affect these developments. Key to students' understanding of cognitive development in middle childhood will be their observation of elementary schoolers at Sibley Elementary.

Masquerades in Africa - HIST 282 - Thabiti Willis (13 students)

Currently on display in the Gould Library is an exhibit featuring the practices studied in this course: masquerade rituals, their cultural meanings, and the histories they recreate. Students will be creating a second exhibit for the library, to present the imagery and interpretations they discovered during the term. Additionally, the class will host fourth and fifth graders visiting from Prairie Creek Community School to share their exhibit and explain the work that went into making it.

Measured Thinking: Reasoning with Numbers about World Events, Health, Science and Social Issues - IDSC 100 - Neil Lutsky (18 students)

In public, professional, personal, and academic life, numbers are essential elements of information and arguments. Students in this class will learn about the use and misuse of numbers for social, political, and scientific purposes. The class will host Running the Numbers, an exhibit of photographer Chris Jordan's work. Following his artistic style, the students will help middle school art classes visually represent important numbers.

Ecosystems Ecology - BIOL 221 - Daniel Hernandez (20 students)

This course studies the Earth's major ecosystems. Students will learn about the processes that constitute ecosystems, as well as the contemporary issues affecting various ecosystems. For the course's civic engagement component, the class will partner with St. Olaf students to organize trips for Greenvale Park Elementary third graders to learn about the ecosystems of Minnesota, while also studying decomposition, herbivory, pollination, and food webs.

Nonviolent Social Change: Theory and Praxis - RELG 276 - Terrance Wiley (10 students)

Nonviolent direct action has created major social and political change across the planet in the last century. This class focuses on the emergence of the theory of nonviolence and the social movements that nonviolent theory helped create and shape. Students in this class will have the opportunity to participate in a weekend-long workshop led by the Alternatives to Violence Project. Those who attend will be trained to participate in nonviolence workshops in prisons both locally and worldwide.

Educational Psychology - EDUC 234 - Deborah Appleman (22 students)

Educational Psychology brings together theory and classroom experience to help Carleton students form a better understanding of teaching and learning. Carleton students act as classroom assistants and tutors in local schools, giving them a context with which to understand their studies. This experience also gives students a chance to reflect upon education and its practices in a hands-on and practical manner.

Race, Immigration, and Urban Schools - EDUC 340 - Anita Chikkatur (6 students)

This course explores the important role that public schools, particularly in urban areas, have played in the American national imagination as the way to socialize students about what it means to be American and to prepare them to participate as citizens in a democracy. One group of students is working with a newly created theater class at Northfield High School for students learning English as a Second Language, and another group is delivering a presentation on college preparation to Spanish-speaking parents of elementary and middle school students.

Health Psychology - PSYC 260 - Ken Abrams (25 students)

Students in small groups will critically examine the effects of local public (e.g., town) or private (e.g., hospital) policies on health outcomes. More specifically, students will work with local policy makers to investigate an issue, propose policy changes supported by theory and research, present formal proposals to the policy makers, and solicit and respond to community feedback. Additionally, groups will present their findings to the class and community representatives at a poster session at the end of the term. Examples of past projects include the development of a heroin use prevention program at Northfield High School, a comprehensive worksite wellness program at Northfield Hospital, and a more accessible and better marketed farmers' market in Northfield.

Ethics of Civic Engagement - SOAN 285 - Adrienne Falcón (20 students)

Intermediate Spanish - SPAN 204.03; 204.08 - Maria Elena Doleman (40 students)

Students in this course are required to spend at least 7 service hours (1 hour per week) working in partnership with the Northfield Public Schools from elementary to high school. In some situations college students work with other students in the Northfield Compañeros program. In other positions, students work in classrooms directly as ESL tutors. In addition to language, the course focuses on immigration and Latino experiences. This project illuminates the local experience of immigrants in Northfield.

Spring '11

Advanced Ceramics - ARTS 330 - Juliane Shibata - 8 students

Environmental Analysis Lab - CHEM/ENTS 329 - Deborah Gross - 2 students

In this lab students will work on a project to assess the air quality in buildings on the Carleton campus, and potentially in the Northfield community. Special attention will be given to determining the particulate matter (PM) concentration, and the contribution of silica to the PM. Results will be reported to occupants of the relevant buildings. In addition, students will have an opportunity to design and carry out their own multi-week experiments which may involve engagement either on campus or in the community.

Art, Religion, and Globalization - RELG 281 - Shanna Sippy - 17 students

Tracing the history of exhibiting cultures, beginning in the late nineteenth century, this class considers how religions and traditions are represented in different contexts with a range of political and social implications. Student wills work with artists-in-residence to consider the role performance plays in constructions of rituals, religions and cultures. Supported, in part, by a MN State Art Grant, the course involves bringing Ragamala, a Minneapolis-based South Indian Dance company, in-residence to Carleton and Northfield over the course of a month. The students in the class, along with Ragamala Company members, will work with students at the Northfield School of Arts and Technology (ARTech) to teach an appreciation for South Asian cultural art forms and the challenges of "representing" and performing culture.

Native American Religious Freedom - RELG 243 - Michael McNally - 13 students

This course explores historical and legal contexts in which Native Americans have practiced their religions in the United States. Making reference to the cultural background of Native traditions, and the history of First Amendment law, the course explores landmark court cases in Sacred Lands, Peyotism, free exercise in prisons, and sacralized traditional practices (whaling, fishing, hunting) and critically examines the conceptual framework of "religion" as it has been applied to the practice of Native American traditions. Service projects will integrate academic learning and student involvement in matters of particular concern to contemporary native communities.

Topics in Probability and Statistics - MATH 315 - Katie St. Clair - 6 of 19 students

Plant Biology - BIOL 236 - Susan Singer - 31 students

Both the Northfield School District and St. Dominic, a Catholic elementary school in Northfield, have made substantial changes in their school lunch programs to emphasize healthy food choices and local food sources. Students in this course will study the nutritional effects of various plant-based lunches, and will create a messaging campaign to encourage students to take advantage of these new lunch options. Students in Katie St. Clair's probability course will measure the effectiveness of these efforts as part of their curriculum.

Women's Health Activism - WGST 250 - Meera Sehgal - 22 students

This course focuses on women’s health movements and feminist activism around reproductive justice in the U.S.. Our explorations will be linked to a Carleton art gallery exhibition titled EveryBody! that highlights the use of graphic teaching aids, polemical publications and artistic projects by women’s health movements to teach women to celebrate “embodied self-knowledge”. Our intellectual focus will be on the role of feminist activism in shifting the discourse around women’s health from medicalized pathology to empowerment. The course will have a civic engagement component that encourages students to develop creative visual approaches to feminist health education in the community

Introduction to Peace Studies - SOAN 236.00 and 236.02 - Nader Saiedi - 8 students

Microbiology w/laboratory - BIOL 234 - Debby Walser-Kuntz - 25 students

Democracy, Diversity, and Education - EDUC 365 - Anita Chikkatur - 8 students

Many Americans expect our public schools to make young people into good citizens who will sustain our democracy. But how are good citizens different from good people or good workers? How do we make good citizens? How can education sustain a democracy? What role do group identities play in shaping this educational process? How do ideals of justice and equality - as well as realities of injustice and inequality - influence our educational system? This course will explore these questions and others by studying both theories and case studies of democratic education and multiculturalism. Students will also serve in and observe at three local public schools: a Spanish-language kindergarten class in Northfield, a girl-focused charter middle school in St. Paul, and a K-8 school focused on Native American students and cultures in Minneapolis. Their experiences with the students and educators in these schools will inform the class's exploration of politics, culture, and education.

Social Welfare - SOAN 215 - Peter Brandon - 5 students

This course asks students to investigate a welfare controversy and take a stand on the issue. Students use a variety of mixed methods to explore a topical issue at the local level. Past projects have included a needs-based study of transportation in Northfield, especially for low-income Northfielders. Students interviewed community leaders and partners and those in need to identify action plans, and helped spark the development of the Northfield Grassroots Transit Initiative, which continues to advocate for better transportation access in the region.

Ethnic Foodways in the U.S. - AMST 252 - Audrey Russek - 19 students

Students will conduct oral history interviews with individuals and organizations involved in ethnic/regional food in Southern Minnesota. The goal is to investigate the history, culture, and economics of this local community. Students will organize transcripts from these interviews into a course website that draws attention to the ethnic food community, and will also draw on the interviews as sources in their final research paper.

Methods of Teaching Mathematics - MATH 349 - Deanna Haunsperger - 10 students

Environmental and Agricultural Politics of the Americas - ENTS 246 - Garrett Graddy - 26 students

Social and Environmental Movements of Latin America - ENTS 253 - Garrett Graddy - 20 students

Winter '11

Ethics of Civic Engagement - SOAN 285 - Adrienne Falcón - 17 students

In this course, students will discuss the ethical questions that arise when they engage with others in research, service, organizing, or policy work. Students will read and talk about the meanings and forms of civic engagement and use these readings to reflect upon their own research or service projects. Gaining insights from sociological and practice based readings, we will examine different perspectives on the ways that power and privilege relate to civic engagement. The winter section will focus on policy, including readings and discussions centered around the Project Pericles Debating for Democracy hosted at Carleton in January.

Immunology - BIOL 310 - Debby Walser-Kuntz - 35 students

Community Video - CAMS 285 - Paul Hager - 5 students

Students are partnering with local organizations such as Growing Up Healthy, Northfield Youth Baseball, Cannon River Sportsmens Club, and campus organizations such as the GSC, to create media in support the organization's mission. Media production can range from short, non-fiction videos to photo essays, web design and podcasts. Students are also working with organizations to help them develop a media plan.

Introduction to Latina/o Studies - AMST 127 - Adriana Estill - 13 students

In collaboration with Growing Up Healthy, students are presenting their research on Latinos in the United States to leaders in Northfield's Latino community. At events in both Faribault and Northfield, students are participating in conversations about the importance of family, religion, health, and education in creating a strong Latino community. Student work focuses on understanding how research on national trends relates to the personal experiences of local Latinos.

Multicultural Education - EDUC 238 - Anita Chikkatur - 8 of 25 students

This course focuses on the respect for human diversity in education, especially in relation to various racial, cultural, and economic groups, and to women. Students will have the opportunity to reflect on and apply classroom topics in a variety of service learning settings, including the Northfield TORCH project's college access program in collaboration with Riverland Community College.

Schooling and Opportunity - EDUC 353 - Anita Chikkatur - 12 students

As a part of the course, the students work in small groups to develop a case study of a local program designed to increase educational access and opportunities. The research involves interviews with program directors and participants, as well as data and document analysis and a literature review. At the end of the term, the final papers will be shared with those involved with the programs so that they can use the research to improve their programs.

African in the Arab World - HIST 280 - Thabiti Willis - 9 students

This course surveyed the development of an African diaspora in the Arab world. Students spent time at S.A.F.E. (Somali American Faribault Education), a local non-profit run for and by members of Faribault's Somali community. They conducted oral interviews and discussions about the Somali diaspora with community members at the S.A.F.E. classes.

Global Religions in Minnesota - RELG 289 - Shanna Sippy - 9 students

Economic Cost-Benefit Analysis - ECON 268 - Aaron Swoboda - 13 students

Community Needs Assessment* - SOAN 275 - Peter Brandon - 16 students
* Part of the Comparative Welfare Systems and Social Safety Nets in Australia Program

Fall '10

Geology in the Field - GEOL 100 - Mary Savina - 14 students

As part of the coursework, students will examine stones used in buildings around Northfield or in their hometowns to determine the geologic histories of these rocks. The Northfield Historical Society will collect and archive the products of this research.

Air Pollution and Human Health - CHEM 100 - Deborah Gross - 14 students

A recent assessment of public health in Minnesota counties gave poor marks to Rice County, especially with regard to its air quality. Students in this class will perform their own air quality measurements in and around Northfield in order to scrutinize the methods and findings of the study and examine how air quality affects the lives of local residents.

Intermediate Spanish - SPAN 204.01; 204.04; 204.05 - Maria Elena Doleman and Linda Burdell - 59 students

Students in this course are required to spend at least 7 service hours (1 hour per week) working in partnership with the Northfield Public Schools from Elementary to High School. In some situations college students work with other students in the Northfield Compañeros program. In other positions, students work in classrooms directly as ESL tutors. The Spanish course focuses on, in addition to Spanish language, issues of immigration and the Latino experience. This project turns the focus on the local experience of immigrants in Northfield.

Native American Religions - RELG 130 - Michael McNally - 28 students

While surveying a broad variety of ways that Native American traditions imagine land, community, and the sacred, the course focuses on the local traditions of the Ojibwe and Lakota communities. Materials include traditional beliefs and practices, the history of missions, intertribal new religious movements, and contemporary issues of treaty rights, religious freedom, and the revitalization of language and culture. Students will have the opportunity to engage with some of Minnesota's Native American cultural institutions, including the Anishinabe Academy magnet school in Minneapolis.

Intro to Educational Studies - EDUC 110 - Anita Chikkatur - 23 students

Students will have the option of gaining hands-on experience as tutors in new after-school programs at Faribault Middle School and High School. These programs attempt to improve college access for local children and will provide Carleton students with the chance to apply and refine skills learned during the course.

Educational Psychology - EDUC 234 - Deborah Appleman - 24 students

Environmental Ethics - ENTS 215 - Kimberly Smith - 24 students

This course allows students apply the ethical debates in environmental policy and practice to five case studies in Northfield. In groups of five to six, students spend the term investigating environmental ethics behind a range of current and pertinent issues in the college and in Northfield. In the process, they get the opportunity to work with actors and stakeholders in the community and consider how environmental ethics play a role in these cases.

Comparative Social Movements - POSC 358 - Devashree Gupta - 16 students

Students in this political science course looked at different social movement theories, including literatures on organizational structures, recruitment, tactical choice, and message framing. Students then applied this knowledge by working with community partners to plan and carry out an event tied to a particular issue or policy area in which they had an interest and that was related to the core work of the community partner. Groups worked on a range of issues, including advocacy for homeless GLBT youth and green technologies and planning in Northfield. Students were encouraged to reflect on their experiences and link their practical work back to the course readings and discussions through a series of blog posts and an end-of-term presentation.

Introduction to Geospatial Analysis - ENTS 120 - Tsegaye Nega - 21 students

After studying the theory and practice of GIS technology, students applied their skills to spatial problems around campus and the country. Projects included determining the ideal placement of the second Carleton wind turbine, the effectiveness of campus lighting, Carleton buildings where solar panels would be effective, and examining home prices around Minneapolis's Hiawatha Line light rail corridor. Students presented their projects at a public poster session.

Spring '10

Ethics of Civic Engagement - SOAN 285 - Adrienne Falcon and Carolyn Fure-Slocum - 21 students

In this course, students will discuss the ethical questions that arise when they engage with others in research, service, organizing, or policy work. Students will read and talk about the meanings and forms of civic engagement and use these readings to reflect upon their own research or service projects, or to reflect upon the college's role in Haiti or Faribault, two areas where college members are actively engaged. Gaining insights from sociological and practice based readings, we will examine different perspectives on the ways that power and privilege relate to civic engagement.

Language and Deception - PSYC 375 - Mija Van Der Wege - 14 students

In this course, students participate in the development of a local episode of Mental Engineering, a television program based in the Twin Cities that brings together academics and commentators to analyze advertisements. This year, the Carleton students will work in three groups to prepare for and perform a mock episode of Mental Engineering, to be hosted by the host of Mental Engineering, John Forde. Two of the performances will be done in the Northfield community, at the high school or middle school, and the third will be in the library Athenaeum for public attendance. The project enables students to apply insights that they have developed from course material to an analysis of advertisements.

Race, Immigration and Urban Schools - EDUC 340 - Anita Chikkatur - 11 out of 20 students

This course explores the important role that public schools, particularly in urban areas, have played in the American national imagination as the way to socialize students about what it means to be American and to prepare them to participate as citizens in a democracy. Students will have the opportunity to engage in community-based research in Faribault with afterschool programs for Somali children.

Advanced Ceramics - ARTS 330 - Kelly Connole -13 students

Students in this art course will create over 500 bowls for a yearly event to highlight the problems that hunger creates in society. The event is called Empty Bowls and includes a fundraiser selling the handmade bowls with soup provided by the Carleton community for the Northfield Food Shelf. Students did research and publicity based on hunger in a local context in collaboration with the Northfield Community Action Center. Bowls are a fundamental skill in the field of ceramics and the bowls that students made for the event were designed as tokens to remind participants to give back.

The Politics of Food - POSC 220 - Pat Cavanaugh - 16 students

Students in this class will present their research on food politics in panel discussions open to the public. They will address questions such as: What do tomatoes have to do with slavery? How did soybeans move from a minor crop to a mega-industry? How has Coca-Cola remained relevant for so long? How has the shrimp industry, past and present, affected marine environments around the U.S.? Are breakfast cereals part of a complete breakfast?

Environmental Ethics - ENTS 215 - Kimberly Smith - 21 students

Educational Studies Senior Seminar - EDUC 395 - Deborah Appleman - 12 students

Winter '10

Anthropology of Health and Illness - SOAN 262 - Pamela Feldman-Savelsberg - 9 of 25 students enrolled

Public Sociology - SOAN 395 - Adrienne Falcón - 8 students

Students in this course conducted needs-based assessments of Northfield and the Rice Country area to identify potential projects and collaborations between Carleton and local organizations. Groups of students focused specifically on the arts, business, and housing sectors. Within these sectors, students interviewed staff members of local organizations and government offices. At the end of the term, students created reports of their sectors and presented their findings in a presentation in which community partners were invited to attend.

Health Psychology - PSYC 260 - Ken Abrams - 25 students

Environmental Economics and Policy - ENTS 271 – Aaron Swoboda - 29 students

This course explores the economic and political institutions affecting the environment. We will use the tools of economics to analyze several contemporary environmental policy issues including climate change, land use, water, transportation and energy. Learning will take place through a mixture of lecture, class discussion, computer labs, small group work, and student presentations. A final group project will involve a political and economic analysis of a local land use issue. There are no prerequisites for the course.

Marginality and Renaissance - FREN 241 - Stephanie Cox - 21 students

This course will examine the Francophone presence in North America (Quebec, Louisiana and Acadia) through works of fiction (novels, plays, songs, films and folktales) and non-fiction(travel writing, memoires, and historical articles). Students will engage in a collective project that will be given to the Center for Cultural and Eco-Tourism at the University of Louisiana-Lafayette. Presented as a website, this class project will offer a series of 3D interactive time lines to show the complex progression and dispersal of the "Grand Dérangement", the Acadian exile undertaken by the English army between 1765 and 1785. We focus on this event because it offers us the surprising survival of a culture that was supposed to have disappeared from the continent but remains alive through the Cajun culture. Through the objective of this website, the students of this class will create as set of quantitative resources on Acadian and Cajun culture and history.

Power of Citizenship - POSC 209 - Pat Cavanaugh - 16 students

Neighborhood-based community organizing can be an effective form of action for citizens at the same time that it reinvigorates democratic practices. In this course we will explore concepts of democracy, power and identity as we examine cases of community organizing in the U.S. When and why do people in a neighborhood come together to take political action? What are the obstacles to community-based political action? What are its limits? Possibilities? What is the role of experts? What should it be? What about the role of government? How do governmental structures, particular circumstances, and social expectations interact?

Modern Hinduism - RELG 265 - Shana Sippy - 7 students

A controversial statement: "Modern Hinduism was defined in engagement with Western discourses of 'religion.'" This course will begin with the ideas of such prominent Hindu thinkers as Rammohan Ray, Vivekananda, Savarkar, and Gandhi, looking to a range of historical and critical materials to ground their voices in the experience of colonialism. We’ll move on to consider contemporary contexts: strains of Indian nationalism; migration and the growth of diasporic Hindu communities overseas; conversion and the transnational spread of modern guru movements; consumerism and globalization. Throughout we'll remain mindful of the question: Why is the theme of this class controversial?

Encountering Islam - RELG 268 - Shana Sippy - 18 students

This course explores discourses that emerged as Islamic traditions encountered other cultures, from the medieval and colonial to the modern. Reading texts--historical, fictional, and ethnographic--we will consider how different religious, political, civic and cultural formations (i.e. Judaism, Christianity, Hinduism, Feminism and the Secular State) engage with Islam. Focused on questions about representation--the perception of Islam by "others," and Muslim self-representation--we will explore the nature of dialogue and alliance, both on the interfaith community and geo-political levels. Students will also explore Minnesota's varied Muslim populations and the nuances at work in contemporary American encounters with Islam.

Introduction to Sociology - SOAN 111 - Annette Nierobisz - 27 students

An introduction to sociology, including analysis of the sociological perspective, culture, socialization, demography, and social class and caste institutions in modern industrial societies and cultures; stability and change in societies of the twentieth century. Pros and cons of various theoretical strategies will be emphasized.

Immunology - BIOL 310 - Debby Walser-Kuntz - 29 students

Students prepared materials about asthma and mold, and then translated them into Spanish. These resources were presented to parents and community leaders in collaboration with Growing Up Healthy and their ongoing efforts to combat mold in local mobile homes.

Fall '09

Truth vs. Power: A Journey in Journalism - ENGL 272 - Doug McGill - 22 students

Journalism is a powerful, socially-useful way to encounter and describe the world. Part literature and part social science, it’s evolved into a fundamental democratic practice. This class surveys journalism's basic theories and methods while giving students many chances to write in a journalistic style. With a "classroom as newsroom" format, students report and write news and feature stories from Northfield and Rice County throughout the term. All the writing assignments receive consistent feedback from the professor, a former New York Times reporter and Bloomberg News bureau chief. Emerging journalistic formats and tools such as multimedia, blogging, SoundSlides, RSS feeds will be explored.

Foundations of Modern Europe - HIST 139 - Susannah Ottaway - 18 out of 28 students

Students in this course have the choice to present a lesson for an elementary school classroom in the place of a traditional research paper. Students who choose the academic civic engagement option will prepare lesson plans for 4^th graders in the Northfield School System on the topic of the Spanish Exploration. The lessons are designed to be interactive and collaborative with the projects that the 4^th graders have been learning previously. This project will require students to reconceptualize the history that they learn in class into ideas that would be useful on the elementary level.

Intermediate Spanish - SPAN 204- Maria Elena Doleman - 204.03 (21 students); 204.08 (21 students)

Moviegoing and Film Exhibition in America - CAMS 310 – Carol Donelan - 8 students

In this seminar in film history, we dive in, researching and writing the “unwritten” histories of movie culture at the local level, making use of primary sources such as newspapers, photographs, interviews and quantitative data. This term, our focus is on the history of motion picture censorship from its origins in 1907 to the advent of the Hollywood Production Code in 1934, with special attention to the exhibition and local reception of pre-Code films, 1929-1934. Fair warning: pre-Code films, which feature drinking, drugs, nudity, sex and violence, are required viewing for the course.

English Writing Seminar – ENGL 109 – Carol Rutz and Nancy Cho - 109.01 (15 students); 109.04 (14 students)

Writing makes thinking visible. In this course, students will use individual research projects as well as readings to develop skills in reflection, reporting, oral presentation, and persuasion. A central component of the course will be individual research about a historic building in downtown Northfield. This investigation will engage students with source material and the written techniques critical to analyzing it while familiarizing them with the surrounding community.

Native American Religious Freedom – RELG 243 - Michael McNally - 21 students

Abrupt Climate Change - ENTS 288 - Trish Ferrett - 31 students

The field of abrupt climate change seeks to understand very fast changes, or "tipping points," in historical climate records. Course topics will include interpretation of data on recent melting trends in the Artic, historical climate data, methods of measuring abrupt changes in ancient climates, theories for abrupt change, the role of complex earth systems, and the connection to current trends in global climate change. The course will also directly address our future vulnerability to abrupt climate change through cases studies of past human civilizations (Natufians, Mayans). Over the term, student teams will produce multi-media web sites through academic civic engagement projects that will serve a community partner organization.

Geomorphology - GEOL 210 - Mary Savina - 14 students

Geology 210 students will be engaging with the community in a number of ways. Students will write literature reviews on topics related to river restoration, a topic related to the Cannon River Watershed Partnership's current efforts to preserve lower Heath Creek and Spring Brook Creek. Landowners in these two watersheds want Northfield to annex their land and develop it. Spring Brook Creek is the only trout stream in Rice County. Several students volunteered for the Cannon River Watershed Partnership's River Clean-up on Saturday, September 19. Along with other volunteers recruited by Nancy Braker, we reckon they collected maybe 600 lbs of tires, etc. from the stretch of river in the arb plus the shores of Lower Lyman Lake.

Introduction to Geospatial Analysis - ENTS 120 - Tsegaye Nega - 19 students

For their final projects, students will be examining the recently completed comprehensive plan for the City of Northfield and addressing the issue of how areas designated for "Priority Growth" and "Urban Expansion" have vague zoning designations that don't take into account regional regulations and topographical features. In order to contribute to an ongoing dialouge about growth in Northfield, students will collaborate with the city to create a GIS model that can be adapted to predict and accomodate future possibilities for urban development in Northfield.

Topics in Virology - BIOL 370 - Debby Walser-Kuntz - 15 students

The course will focus on the most recent developments in HIV-related research, including implications for HIV-treatment and vaccines and the impact of viral infection on the immune system of the host. As part of the coursework, students will be expected to create a lesson for Life Sciences students at Northfield Middle School explaining the properties and importance of a particular virus.

Spring '09

Advanced Ceramics - ARTS 330 - Kelly Connole Students in this art course created over 500 bowls for a yearly event to highlight the problems that hunger creates in society. The event was called Empty Bowls and included a fundraiser selling the handmade bowls with soup provided by the Carleton community for the Northfield Food Shelf. Students did research and publicity based on hunger in a local context in collaboration with the Northfield Community Action Center. Bowls are a fundamental skill in the field of ceramics and the bowls that students made for the event were designed as tokens to remind participants to give back.

Nonfiction Video Production - CAMS 270 - Paul Hager Students are partnering with local organizations such as Growing Up Healthy, Northfield Youth Baseball, Cannon River Sportsmens Club, and campus organizations such as the GSC, to create media in support the organization's mission. Media production can range from short, non-fiction videos to photo essays, web design and podcasts. Students are also working with organizations to help them develop a media plan.

Educational Studies Senior Seminar - EDUC 395 - John Ramsay Students in this course were tasked to design and create the “next great education non-profit.” As part of their work, they will be shadowing staff at organizations such as Three Rivers Community Action Center, ABC, and Admission Possible to better understand how an education non-profit works. Students will also be developing policy and grant proposals for an education non-profit.

Geology of Soils - GEOL 258 - Mary Savina Students produced a formal report about the properties of the topsoil in the expansion area for the Carleton garden and evaluated whether "black dirt" removed from the new dorm excavation will be valuable (or not) to add to the topsoil. The final projects for the class will focus on several soils-related questions in the Arboretum. Example: Based on soil characteristics, should Alumni Field be restored to prairie, savannah or forest?

Health Psychology - PSYC 260 - Ken Abrams Students in small groups are critically examining the effects of local public (e.g., town) or private (e.g., hospital) policies on health outcomes. More specifically, students are working with local policy makers to investigate an issue, propose policy changes supported by theory and research, present formal proposals to the policy makers, and solicit and respond to community feedback. Additionally, groups will present their findings to the class and community representatives at a poster session at the end of the term. Examples of current projects include the development of a heroin use prevention program at Northfield High School, a comprehensive worksite wellness program at Northfield Hospital, and a more accessible and better marketed farmers' market in Northfield.

Language and Deception - PSYC 375 - Mija Van Der Wege In this course, students participate in the development of a local episode of Mental Engineering, a television program based in the Twin Cities that brings together academics and commentators to analyze advertisements. This year, the Carleton students will work in three groups to prepare for and perform a mock episode of Mental Engineering, to be hosted by the host of Mental Engineering, John Forde. Two of the performances will be done at the Northfield high school for social psychology classes and the third will be in the library Athenaeum for public attendance. The project enables students to apply insights that they have developed from course material to an analysis of advertisements.

Historic Preservation - ARTH 309 - Baird Jarman
This class focused on the history and professionalization of the preservation movement, chiefly in the United States, along with legal, ethical, and financ

Historical Course Offerings

A historical record of civic engagement courses offered before the formation of the ACE office.

Carleton College

Academic Civic Engagement