Samford University’s Frances Marlin Mann Center for Ethics and Leadership has selected six faculty members from the humanities, arts, business and law as 2017-18 Faculty Fellows in Community-Based Learning.
The Mann Center has tripled the number of scholars up from two in the program’s inaugural year.
“I am so pleased that Samford University is rapidly developing its capacity to further integrate the pedagogy of service-learning into its curriculum across disciplines,” says Mann Center Director Drayton Nabers Jr. “We look forward to what the new fellows will bring to our undergraduate and graduate students and broader community through their work in partnership with local organizations.”
The new Mann Faculty Fellows are:
Carlos Aleman, assistant professor of history in Howard College of Arts and Sciences and director of the Latin American Studies Scholars Program.
Douglas Clapp, associate professor of classics, Howard College of Arts and Sciences.
LaJuana Davis, professor and director of assessment, Cumberland School of Law.
Amy Snow, director of clinical services and assistant professor, Department of Nurse Anesthesia, Ida Moffett School of Nursing.
Joseph Cory, associate professor of visual arts, School of the Arts.
Barbara Cartledge, assistant dean of academic programs and assistant professor, Brock School of Business.
As part of the one-year fellowship, each of the six scholars will develop a new or redesign an existing service learning course that will be taught within the 2018-19 academic year.
This fellowship includes six faculty development workshops offered through a partnership between the Mann Center and UAB’s Office of Service Learning to encourage the use of best practices in community-based learning across a variety of schools and disciplines at Samford, said Allison Nanni, the university’s director of community engagement in the Mann Center. The program also leverages community connections and administrative and financial resources for the faculty fellows by developing mutually beneficial partnerships with community partners to support the professors in the practice of pedagogy. Previous program graduates also provide individual mentorship to each of the participants.
“I am honored to participate as a Mann Center Fellow,” said Snow. “As the next generation of nurse anesthetists are under our wing here at Samford for a short period of time, I feel compelled to effectively incorporate best practices of the pedagogy into our program in an even more focused and intentional way.”
Rachel Casiday, associate professor of public health, and Betsy Dobbins, Paul N. Propst Professor of Natural Sciences, were the inaugural Mann Faculty Fellows in 2016-17. They developed a course that sent biology and public health students together to investigate the effects of water pollution in rural Perry County, Alabama.
