Bonner Center for Civic and Community Engagement

FSP Courses & CEL: Project Summaries

• Schools and the American Dream (Professor Sarah Kern) students developed and helped implement a community engaged learning day/experience for 17 other First Year (FY) students at the Gregory Elementary School in Trenton. The day started with a discussion of a Jonathan Kozul essay and the connection between race/class and education. At Gregory, the students helped elementary school students complete their homework and participated in enrichment activities with them.
• Values and Action (Professor Janet Hubbard) students completed an outreach project that generated a stockpile of donated tools (valued at $800) from the families of First Year (FY) students as well as local businesses and contractors. These donations were donated to Habitat for Humanity’s ReUse store in Trenton. Before initiating this project, the students spent a day helping build a home for a single mother in East Trenton under the direction of the Bonner Scholars’ Housing team—and they visited the store, which is located on the same block.
• Income Inequality (Professor Michele Naples) students worked at three different non-profit organizations that serve the poor. One team worked at Habitat for Humanity; another group tutored refugees at an after-school program (Bethany Lutheran Church); the third prepared and served a meal for the homeless at the Rescue Mission. (This project led to the expansion of the Bonner Community Scholars Program and Bethany Lutheran is now a regular Bonner site.)
• Autism Deconstructed (Shri Rao) students traveled to The Visitation Home each week and participated in a variety of interactive enrichment and educational activities with residents of this complex (2 suburban homes), located in nearby Hamilton. Among other activities, the FSP students and residents created arts and crafts projects togehter, played board games, participated in recreational games--and even went bowling and enjoyed a pizza party.
• Multicultural New York (Matthew Winkel) students rode to Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty with middle school students from Greg Grant’s Academic Sports Academy. The FSP students acted as educational guides and big brothers/big sisters for the day.
• Urban Parks (Marcia Steinberg) - students took a tour of the historic Caldwalder Park in Trenton and completed a much needed beautification project that focused on the area around the John L. Roebling monument. The students also used Polaroid cameras and produced visual assessments of the park—primarily to help identify the next round of projects for the city and volunteers.
• Listening to Depression (Mary Goldschmidt) students established a new chapter of Active Minds on Campus, an educational organization that aims to increase awareness about mental health issues and provide information about available resources. The students also developed a website for the community and delivered a workshop that was attended by 45 TCNJ students.
• Innovative Programs: In addition to these project summaries, more information can be found about two innovative FSP programs via the two links found in the top right hand corner of this page.

• Youth Development Institute
• Virtual World FSP Project