STUDENTS

Over 500 University of Utah students have helped or continue to help build reciprocal relationships between the University and west Salt Lake neighborhoods.

What is UNP’s role when students want to become a partner?: Most of the student involvement at UNP is through the seven service-learning courses that have been established to support a UNP partnership. In addition, about 30 students each semester are placed at Hartland Partnership Center though a practicum, service learning classs, or internships through the College of Social Work, College of Nursing, College of Law, department of linguistics, department of family and consumer students, division of occupational therapy, department of family and preventative medicine, nurse midwifery and women's health nurse practiioner program, UNP also hires students as staff members. At times, partnership needs also require additional internship positions that UNP can help to support. Currently, there are three internship positions supporting YES partnerships, but as partnership needs change, so may these positions.

      Seven service-learning courses affiliated with UNP partnerships have been developed by University faculty.

• This spring was the third time the political science class, Neighborhood Democracy, was offered. It is a course designed to provide students with the opportunity to study issues of grassroots democracy through a service-learning course where the students partner with the Rose Park Community Council to organize the annual Rose Park Community Festival.
• A graduate seminar held off-campus for the third time this spring in the Westside Studio engages students to design a revitalization and redevelopment plan for west Salt Lake neighborhoods that are shaped by resident and community leaders contributions.
• Faculty who have students placed at the UNP Harland Partnership Center teach an interdisciplinary cluster seminar addressing social, cultural, political and economic issues from a variety of different disciplinary perspectives. Both students and Hartland residents, and faculty attend this class. Narratives compiled by Hartland residents make up part of the text used in this course.
• The partnership at West High School initiated a section of the service learning class LEAP 1300, which has enrolled 30 to 35 students each year to serve as peer advisors for their counterparts at West High School.
• This fall, an ethnic studies service learning course is being co-taught by the principle investigators of the Adelante partnership, who conceptualized the class as a way to help the institution think differently about communities of color, as well as partner more concretely with the Adelante mentors by helping them develop a critical consciousness of the inequities inherent in the K-12 school system for students of color. This class places first generation college students as mentors in an elementary school with potential first-generation college students.
• In spring 2007, family and consumer studies faculty Marissa Diener taught a service-learning class where eight students assisted in developing community advocate training for west Salt Lake families.
• For the past three semesters, eight University of Utah early childcare students enrolled in a child development practicum through family and consumer studies are acquiring valuable teaching experience at the Hartland Head Start Center. The students work four hours one day a week in order to earn three hours of credit towards their early childhood certification, for a total of 920 hours. They plan and implement learning activities and work on academic and social goals for the thirty children enrolled at Hartland Head Start. They are under the joint supervision of the department of Family and Consumer Studies and SLCAP Head Start.

     Thanks to the generous support of the Alumni Association at the University of Utah, Youth Education & Success here at UNP has currently filled three paid student internship positions to help strengthen the YES partnerships. The Service Learning Intern with the Salt Lake Center for Science Education (SLCSE) will research and develop ways in which students at the SLCSE can plan and implement their own service learning experiences to help empower and support the community where their school is located. Another intern will be working with the Community Advocate Partnerships as a Research Assistant, primarily interviewing families in order to have their voices be central in developing initiatives for institutional change. The Youth Book Exchange Intern works with our Book Masters to plan and implement literacy and science based lectures, activities, and opportunities for the youth who attend the Book Exchange each Friday.

What kind of research have UNP student partners produced?:  

     Three dissertations or master’s theses have been produced by UNP partners, with an other four dissertations in progress. Faculty and students have facilitated nine conference presentations. Twelve research reports have been issued by student of faculty and student collaboration.

     An example of a student presentation was when University of Utah Adelante mentors presented at a national conference in the spring of 2007 about their experiences mentoring in the dual language program at Jackson Elementary.          The workshop, entitled “Speak out: English Only and how we are overcoming it,” discussed how the Adelante partnership fits into the history and current political environment of the state of Utah. The student presenters claim the state has a legacy of denying and suppressing the language and culture of the indigenous Latinos who have lived in the area for centuries. Utah’s English-Only 2 law is an example of that legacy, said Macias. They then contrasted this reality with their experiences of how Spanish is embraced in Jackson Elementary’s dual language program. The presenters anticipate that these kindergartners and first graders not only will get to develop fluency in Spanish and English, but will see their culture and language as an asset that will lead them to pursue higher education. “Sharing the knowledge they have gained is a great example of how student mentors benefit from the Adelante partnership,” said Dr. Enrique Alemán, Jr.

While a master’s student, Deb Callister, facilitated directed interviews with Glendale neighborhood residents that sought to address potential cultural barriers to community dialogue in a neighborhood where long-time Caucasian Mormon residents, Spanish-speaking and Pacific Island immigrants, and refugees from war-torn African and European countries all co-exist.  She used grounded theory to connect themes from her interviews with  communication co-cultural, critical and conflict theories. She found that late nineteenth century discursive practices remain pervasive in today’s discourses about these marginalized communities.  These traditional responses to difference reify financial, educational, and language barriers faced by the majority of residents living within these marginalized spaces.  The author suggests strategies to alter traditional discourses and to facilitate dialogue about diversity and the futures of Glendale’s community.

What do students say about UNP partnerships?:

Katrina Miller, early childhood education, sophomore:

I’m involved in Hear Start because I’m taking a class that is designed to give you hands on information of teaching. I will be assisting the teacher in the classroom and practicing the different learning techniques on the children. Originally it is done at the University preschool. But they gave me the option of coming to Head Start. When I heard what Head Start did I was really excited to have such an opportunity. It will be a learning experience in itself.

From hearing other people talk of their experiences in Head Start, I think that I could easily become involved with Head Start even after my class is complete. I love helping people and seeing them grow. That is one of the main reasons I have decided to become a teacher. It’s great to see people acquire knowledge and skills to become better people!

Since I haven’t actually been teaching at Hartland yet, it is hard to say what the challenges are. But as from seeing what kind of people are there I think that the language barrier will be somewhat of a challenge to me. I also think that the culture ‘shock’ will be a challenge. The challenges are not only for me but are one of the few for the children. It will be exciting to see them change and get to know them and their story.

Ashlie Nanes, English Teaching Major and a ESL teaching minor

I have lived and traveled all over the world and I appreciate different cultures, languages, etc. I love diversity and love the fact that people can come to America from all over the world. I love how raw Hartland is. There is a great love behind Hartland/UNP and I want to be a part of that love and service.

I think there is a lot to be learned at Hartland. It is good to get ‘outside the box’ and to be uncomfortable. I think that students at the University (and in general) learn the best that way. When we get outside our comfort zone we can push ourselves farther than we thought we could ever go.

The University contributes a lot of service hours as well as a lot of expertise in different fields. I think that the students at the University genuinely care about what they are doing at Hartland and both parties are benefited.

For those who considering partnering with Hartland / UNP, I would say DO IT! It is an amazing opportunity to learn and grow as a student and as an individual. There is a lot to be learned about different fields of study, but what I find most important is what I am learning about the world around me, myself, and other people. My mind, heart, and spirit have completely opened up so much from working with the people at Hartland, while pushing me further into the depths of my field.

I absolutely love working with students here (I work mainly with the female African refugees and the Middle Eastern women). I am learning so much about their cultures and lives and it truly blesses my life.

The most challenging aspect of working at Hartland is working with students that are on so many different academic levels. It is a definite challenge. It is a struggle to adapt curriculum to every person. Sometimes there is an entire class on different levels. It is hard to be with every student at the same time. It seems like some of the students are always waiting and other students get all of the time.

I think UNP is doing an amazing job at what they do. I have the opportunities to do lesson plans, receive criticism from cooperating teachers, etc. Kim (Hartland Coordinator) and Ellen have been amazing players in my education.
 

Kyung ock Cho, Social Work
It is great working with Hartland / UNP tie. I can use my academic knowledge in a professional setting, that is teaching English to speakers of other languages.

I have B.A in social work so I am interested in this UNP program. It is really interesting that the University has a link to a real community. Students can use their knowledge and share their passion under systematic supervision of faculty.

Heather McKinnon, Social Work intern
  What is not hard about Hartland? Nothing. Even getting into the bathroom for two seconds is difficult. The thing is that while almost every day you feel like crying but do not have the time, you also love every moment of what you do and can think of no other place in this valley that could offer you an opportunity as rich as this.

Minette Ramirez, Social Work intern
Working with people at Hartland has been a great experience. I have met so many people from such diverse places all with a different culture, language, beliefs, etc.  It has been a truly new and wonderful experience working with them, learning all about them, and getting to know them.  As we have taught we also have been taught. The greatest challenge has been understanding the great vast differences we all have and working with those beliefs in order to share more knowledge with them without offending someone.

Neighborhood Democracy students (compiled by Dr. Luke Garrott):            

• In written evaluations, 90% of students strongly agreed with the statement “I learned a great deal” in the course, and rated the effectiveness of the course equally strongly. Their responses reveal that they developed technical skills—through the doing of community work—as well as qualities of character like ingenuity and persistence in the face of intimidating challenges. In addition, communication and the other elements of cooperation were required skills to the pass the class’s service component—and indeed, the grand majority of students said they developed their collaborative skills in the course.  All agreed that they gained “a better understanding of diverse groups and issues related to diversity.”
• “I have been able to first and foremost be educated on a part of the city I was originally unfamiliar with and because of that have changed my views on the Rose Park area itself.  Before I started this class I had the same opinion of Rose Park that most people who are unfamiliar with the city do, that is, a negative outlook ... at our first meeting I was impressed by the gorgeous library building ... the brand new elementary school... and the well lit streets and tidy homes.  I have since learned however that Rose Park is a community full of citizens who are proud of their city and want to let others know it.”
• “My role as volunteer coordinator from outside the community seemed to be more to help organize and facilitate communication between the other committee members. There were three people on the volunteer committee and three different approaches to recruiting volunteers. My role was to attempt contact with community organizations who had not before participated in the community council or other community activities, mainly church organizations such as the Christian Community church, the Vietnamese Buddhist Temple, the local Catholic church, and Unity Baptist church. Rosemary’s approach was to make contact with the LDS church leaders in the areas as well as middle and high school administrators to recruit teenagers as volunteers.  Juan’s approach was to use his personal social capital to ask everyone he knows or comes in contact with to be a volunteer.”
• “Going into this project I was under the notion that we would be operating under a pre-established framework.  I quickly became aware however that we were pioneering the conception and implementation of this event. I also found my community member partner to be quite adversarial. I noticed this because I was starting to take her skepticism personally since I at this point personally cared about the outcome of the project. In the end, this project blew my socks off and I’m proud to have been a part of it.”
• “While I may not have had the most open mind during the process leading up to the festival, I can say that my mind opened as I watched families from the community come together in such a way that not only benefited them but benefited me as well. While I was confined to the arts and crafts area, I witnessed children choose projects that benefited not themselves but their families. We had many projects for the children to choose from and they chose practical projects first, like toothbrush holders and coat racks, passing by the projects that I would be inclined to take such as dump trucks and airplanes.”
• “All in all I can say that my preconceptions of community council meetings were a tad off.  This wasn’t what I would call action packed, but it was entertaining at times watching the interaction between the citizens and the guest speakers. I enjoyed a certain feeling in the meeting. I felt like I was part of the ‘grass roots’ of politics in that room.”

Nichole Garcia, Social Justice/Education major, Chicana/o Studies minor
Working with the Adelante Project as well as the students at Jackson allows me to give back to my community.  It is important that these students know that they are able to receive a higher education and that they are smart.  I like the fact that I can tell the students at Jackson that they will and can go to college and be where I am someday.  The students teach me so much.  They really love to correct me when I say something in Spanish and I did not pronounce it right.  I also ask them how to say certain words in Spanish and they are always willing to tell me it’s really great.  The activity I enjoy doing most with the students is when I read to class.  They are always excited for a new book or a book they know.  I also love when we sing the alphabet military style.  They march in place and sing to the top of their lungs it is very fun to experience learning out loud. 

Chris Macias, History major
The Adelante program is a way for me to expand my way of thinking towards all people, including children.  At the University of Utah, I deal mostly with adults and their opinions on society. The Jackson Elementary kids have still much to learn and I feel they have a different perspective on the world coming from a child’s point of view.  Also, becoming a teacher is something that I have begun to consider, I know the Adelante Children will help to clarify my doubt on this career. The Adelante students have taught me that the world is “simple.”  They get their point across without having to elaborate or incorporate the use of big or confusing words.  It is a way of communicating I plan to adopt. The activities I enjoy most with these children are those where they teach me. When I read to them, they are telling me the story and what is about to happen.

Eduardo Reyes, fresman
Adelante is more than a program; it is a place where college stuff and students get the opportunity to learn and mentor future leaders of our community. I want to work with students at Jackson because they represent my community. I know that my mentoring at Jackson will shape their lives and will make them more familiar with college. These students teach me to always remember my community. They show me the problems that my community is facing and also how it is shaping their lives. By helping them, they are also helping me become a great leader. They are the students with whom I get to practice my education and my skills. I like all the activities I have with these students. Most of all, I like to sing with these students. They take me back to the days when I was in Mexico. When they sing, they show their real leadership and the great skills that they have. They also make me feel very happy because their voices are the most charming sounds that only they have. They are walking happiness.

Jesse Leigh Joe, Sophomore
When I heard about the whole idea about Adelante and its purpose, I knew right away I wanted to be apart of it. Before I came to the university, I was a substitute teacher with the local school district. I loved it and thought this would be a good way to keep myself interacting with students. By being apart of Adelante, I get to see different teaching pedagogies, especially with the bilingual program Jackson Elementary has. First and foremost, how children of that age can learn 2 different languages at the same time. I find that amazing and always will.  It's amazing how the mind works. Also, with the stresses of college life, I've learned to relax while with the students.  Part of my mentoring hour was during their recess and I loved how playful they can be and how it was so easy to go along with that. With the Spanish speakers,  I've learned to slow things down for them so they can learn the materials. Also, choosing my words carefully when describing something or giving instructions. The whole experience is very enjoyable. I love it all, being in the classroom or playing outside. I must say though, this experience is pushing my decision towards becoming a teacher. 

Deborah Callister, grad student in communication
The community was of vital importance to my research, because one of the main purposes of the research was to identify a basis for initiating community dialogue in the Glendale neighborhood.  Certainly, the community affected the questions I asked, although the majority of the open ended questions that I used for the informant-directed interviews would be applicable in any diverse community.

Crafting the questions so that they were void of judgment took more time than I imagined.  My foray into community based research yielded a continual call for flexibility and a need to adapt the data gathering criteria to accommodate emergent themes. Grounded theory provided an appropriate framework for dealing with these aspects of the research; however, this process presented frequent challenges to project/research boundaries. This research project demanded arduous reflexivity and a heightened awareness of my participatory role in it as a privileged woman of Northern European dissent. Additionally, my inability to speak Spanish greatly limited who I was able to interview. Finally, getting the research findings into a format that could be used by the community was more challenging than I imagined.

The use of historical/critical methods allowed me to identify common discursive practices, in response to ethnic and cultural differences in Salt Lake City, between the time of the Mormon settlement of the city, in the mid-1800’s, and the early twenty first century.  This discovery led me to examine the symbolic meaning of certain terms/phrases and to recommend community dialogue about these terms to deconstruct them or to better understanding their symbolic meanings from diverse cultural perspectives.  I think it would be interesting to study how many other cities in America are characterized by this protracted phenomenon of traditional discursive responses to difference.

I am struck by the value of using informant directed interviews and grounded theory to provide a “snapshot” of broad community perspectives on certain social conditions (e.g. the meaning of diversity).  I believe that interdisciplinary research is necessary to advance our understanding of social responses to difference.  I believe that by increasing our awareness of and knowledge about human responses to cultural differences we can begin to create more effective tools/methods for facilitating non-violent social responses to conflict. Additionally, I found Orbe’s co-cultural theory to be highly relevant.  When language barriers prevent verbal communication among neighbors, certain non-verbal ways of communicating can signal underlying cultural tensions or conflict.  Through research, we can learn more about these non-verbal co-cultural responses to difference.  For example, some participants referenced maintaining interpersonal barriers as a way of responding to cultural tensions, such as avoiding certain neighborhood areas, or building front yard screens/privacy fences.  Nuanced understanding of non-verbal co-cultural responses to difference may allow communities to pick-up on cultural tensions or conflicts before they escalate and become intractable.