





































Authors
MICHAEL VALLIANT  
Service-Learning Program 
Director, Indiana University 
Bloomington 

MEGAN BETZ  
Instructional Consultant/
Community Engagement 
Coordinator, Indiana Univer-
sity Bloomington

Community voice has persistent-
ly, and to degrees, been present in 
pockets of curricular and co-cur-
ricular community engagement at 
Indiana University – Bloomington 
(IUB). The Bloomington Volunteer 
Network (BVN), a program of the 
City of Bloomington, was instrumen-
tal in creating service-learning infra-
structure on campus over 20 years 
ago and continues participation in 
regular meetings of campus-commu-
nity stakeholders. Centering com-
munity voice in campus activities 
requires deliberate action by campus 
to create space to hear from com-
munity stakeholders. This is partic-
ularly true on a large, decentralized 
campus. Bloomington is described as 
a college town and houses the main 
campus of the Indiana University 
system. IUB hosts 43,503 students,1 
who are included in the estimated 
Bloomington population of 84,067.2 

The Listening to Communities (LTC) 
structure supported by Indiana  

Campus Compact (ICC) are for-
mal methods employed by the 
Service-Learning Program (SLP), 
housed in the Center for Innova-
tive Teaching and Learning (CITL), 
to engage a broad range of com-
munity agencies in conversation 
about our ongoing partnerships 
and engagement. Since 2013, SLP 
has hosted four LTC conversations 
evolving from setting priorities for 
the program to expanding on com-
munity-identified themes around 
engagement. The most recent was a 
two-part event using the LTC struc-
ture to solicit community partners’ 
concerns, questions, and interest in 
campus-community partnerships. 

Lucy Schaich, BVN Coordinator, 
and Efrat Feferman, United Way of 
Monroe County Executive Director, 
co-facilitated the events to ensure 
conversation centered on commu-
nity. Through our partnership with 
BVN, we secured a room in City Hall 
and offered free parking for both 

MICHAEL VALLIANT AND MEGAN BETZ 

Learning from “Listening 
to Communities” 

1 U.S. News & World Report. (2019). Overview of Indiana University—Bloomington. Retrieved from 
https://www.usnews.com/best-colleges/indiana-university-bloomington-18092 

2 City of Bloomington Office of the Mayor. (2019). Bloomington Census Data. Retrieved from https://
bloomington.in.gov/about/censusdata

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Representatives from area nonprofits and public entities work together on an affinity mapping exercise to determine 
their top priorities and questions they would like to resolve over the course of the day. Photo credit: Michael Valliant  -

conversations. Our winter LTC, hosted December 
13, brought together 42 attendees from 32 com-
munity organizations and three IUB programs. 
The spring event, hosted April 18, had 16 attend-
ees from 11 community organizations.3 Attend-
ees represented nonprofits working in Monroe 
County, predominantly serving Bloomington; due 
to this geographic focus and a similar restriction 
for most service-learning, conversation centered 
on Bloomington. Across both events, 39 unique 
community organizations attended with strong 
representation from youth-serving organizations 
and human services. 

Our goals were to develop a community-guided 
understanding of opportunities for campus- 

community collaboration and offer better support 
of the community. The fall event included several 
conversations. First, we asked the community 
to set topics of conversation; these centered on 
barriers to creating needed partnerships. We then 
completed SWOT analyses and mapping activi-
ties to explore how spatial, structural, and skill 
barriers create gaps in IUB students’ service to 
the community.  

The best outcome of these events was creating 
often requested space for networking and re-
source-sharing. In spring, we invited represen-
tatives from three agencies4 to present on their 
experience with service-learners. Following the 
presentations and time for discussion, rather than 

3 To minimize the dominant power of an institution the size of IUB, we limited representation in the room. Neither students nor faculty 
were invited to the event. In our experience, community partners are more candid and disclose a fuller picture of their experience work-
ing with students when neither population is present.

4 Immense thanks to Liz Grenat, Executive Director of Community Justice and Mediation Center; Scott Evans, Community In Schools 
- Site Coordinator at Templeton Elementary; and Choonhyun Jeon of the Monroe County Community School Corporation’s Cultural 
Competency and Diversity Coordinator for sharing their experience creating a range of service - learning and community engagement 
opportunities for IUB students.

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moving into the planned sessions, we adapted to 
interest in continuing the morning’s conversa-
tions. Moving chairs into a circle, we shared what 
makes a successful partnership and what support 
and resources could facilitate better partnerships. 

Partners shared how the structure of academia 
impacts their work. Decentralization and shifts 
in instructor assignment and course offerings 
complicates partnership management. Further, 
while we frame service-learning as responsive 
to community need, partners argue they are still 
responding to campus-identified needs. Agencies 
want to be accommodating in support of student 
learning; many take on partnerships resulting in 
outputs duplicating past student efforts or requir-
ing additional work to improve quality and utility.  

Moving forward, following Lucy’s advice reflecting 
on the events, we will seek input from community 
partners as we set goals for the day, inviting them 
to take ownership of sessions. We will also con-

tinue conversation by hosting more networking 
events. Following Efrat’s advice, we will further 
research what work has already addressed similar 
questions to those on our agenda and increase 
time preparing facilitators, ensuring they un-
derstand objectives and are prepared to support 
conversation.  

Lucy also highlighted the importance of report-
ing results in an accessible format to support the 
investment made by partners in the conversation. 
Following the fall LTC, we prepared a report that 
was distributed to attendees for additional input, 
then to the community broadly through BVN’s 
newsletter. A similar report is in preparation for 
the spring conversation, which will ask how the 
community would like to continue conversations 
about shared work. To share results with campus 
community-engaged professionals, we shared 
results at our in-house spring conference, on the 
CITL blog5, and at the 2019 ICC Service Engage-
ment Summit. 

5 See the blog post here: https://blogs.iu.edu/citl/2019/06/12/listening-to-communities/#.XYEbydNKgWo

Attendees gathered to learn more about community-engaged learning opportunities. Here, Jessica Adams, ACE 
Program Coordinator, explains how our student employees (Advocates for Community Engagement) support agencies 
throughout Bloomington.  Photo credit: Michael Valliant

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Attendees gather to look at and discuss concept maps they created to visualize their understanding of how community- 
engaged learning and campus-community partnerships support the Bloomington community.  Photo credit: Michael Valliant

Two representatives from area nonprofits discuss a concept map attendees created, sharing the barriers they believe 
prevent more widespread community engagement. Photo credit: Michael Valliant

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