Community learning can contribute to a faculty portfolio in the three key areas for retention, promotion and tenure.

Enhance your teaching effectiveness

• • Develop more powerful curricula that provides students with a "real world" context for theory and discipline-specific knowledge, thereby helping students to retain more relevant information.
  • Raise students' awareness about current social issues as they relate to academic areas of interest.
  • Engage students in powerful, interactive classroom discussions that invite new perspectives and personalize student learning.
  • Develop students' critical thinking, writing, and interpersonal communication skills.
  • Help students learn about the complexities of social systems and community problems.

Advance research & scholarship efforts:

• • Identify new areas for research and publication, thereby increasing opportunities for professional recognition and reward.
  • Present your professional papers at state, regional and national conferences.
  • Publish findings in higher education publications or applied academic journals.
  • Make your work visible and emphasize quality.

Serve the university and surrounding community

• • Leverage your ability to provide direct service and/or research benefiting the community.
  • Offer professional skills and expertise to the nonprofit agencies where students are serving.
  • Serve on the advisory board of directors for the nonprofit agencies with which the community learning class "partners."
  • Increase visibility for the University by facilitating local media coverage of your community learning projects.
  • Make community learning presentations