Public Service Council

INDIVIDUAL SERVICE LEARNING GRANTS

Purpose
The Public Service Council (PSC) furthers the mission of DePaul by broadening the opportunities for students, faculty and staff to apply their specialized expertise in ways that will contribute to the social, economic, cultural and ethical quality of life in the Chicago metropolitan area, especially in low-income underserved communities. Public service is understood as activities that carry resources from the university into the community. The Public Service Council seeks to promote projects that provide service learning experiences that benefit both the student and the community.

Service learning benefits both the student and the community. This reciprocal relation differentiates service learning from experiential learning. Experiential learning brings the student out of the classroom and into the community, but the benefits of experiential learning are focused on the student rather than the student and the community. Experiential learning projects are valuable and should be expanded, but the proper source of DePaul support for these projects is the Quality of Instruction Council.

Instructional Grants
Service Learning Instructional Grants are designed to increase and improve the opportunities for DePaul students to incorporate meaningful public service and service learning into their course work. Up to $4,500 will be provided to DePaul faculty and staff in support of their efforts to link the content of new or existing course work with meaningful public service, to enhance student learning of the course's content through public service, and to enable DePaul to continue to expand its mission of service to the community. The Council encourages innovative approaches to integrating public service and service learning into DePaul's curricular offerings.  Faculty undertaking community-based service learning should consult with the Steans Center two quarters in advance of the course offering.  Please contact Center staff directly for information and available resources.  A letter of support from the Steans Center should accompany the proposal.

Research Grants
Participatory action research and community action research projects should be submitted to the PSC and not the University Research Council. The model for the campus-community research partnerships should be genuinely collaborative and driven by community rather than campus interests.  The process must constitute a significant learning opportunity for students, and the outcomes must benefit the community in an important way.

Up to $4,500 will be provided to DePaul faculty in support of their efforts to engage in research that examines the benefits of service learning courses to the community and DePaul students. The proposal should document how the goals and work plan were developed in collaboration with community partners.  Letters of support from community organizations should be included. In addition, research results should be shared with the Steans Center, which is institutionally responsible for gathering data on community-based service learning outcomes. Research in the following three areas of service learning will be considered. 

• Community-based research in which community concerns foster and inform action research. The knowledge created seeks to achieve positive social change. 
• Research with community partners to study the processes and outcomes of community-based service learning.  Research is focused on the extent to which community initiatives are attained as well as other impacts on community. 
• Research that studies the academic learning goals of service-learning on students in order to design more powerful academic programs.  Research will focus on the instructional processes needed to achieve these goals.

Application Deadline
The deadlines are 5 pm. on October 15 and March 15. Projects can begin December 1 or May 1 and run for eighteen months. Late applications cannot be accepted.

Eligibility
Full- and part-time faculty and full-time staff are eligible for instructional grants. Part-time faculty and full-time staff members, however, must submit a proposal in conjunction with a full-time faculty member. Full-time faculty are eligible for research grants. Grant recipients, who have overspent their grants, will not be eligible until the overage is resolved. Faculty are expected to consult with the Steans Center in developing their proposals.

Instructional Grants:

• likelihood that the project will improve curricular offerings in degree-credit programs at DePaul
• degree of advancement beyond the current course content
• depth of relationships with external public service agencies or organizations
• link between in-class learning and learning in the community
• clarity of measurable learning goals
• structure of community service activities, and likelihood that students' work will further their learning and benefit the community
• quality of project design and likelihood that the course planning activities will be completed in the time allotted
• submission of all necessary course approvals from appropriate chairs or deans.

Research Grants:

• academic quality of the research project
• likelihood that the research project will result in a scholarly product
• depth of relationships with external public service agencies or organizations
• link between in-class learning and learning in the community
• clarity of measurable learning goals
• structure of community service activities, and likelihood that students' work will further their learning and benefit the community
• quality of project design and likelihood that the course planning activities will be completed in the time allotted

Budget
Total project budgets can be up to $4,500. Up to $3,000 can be allocated to a taxable summer stipend shared by the applicants. The remainder can fund non-professional salary expenses such as office, supplies, and student assistance. Use the budget form (click here to download the budget form) to describe the funds requested. A short budget narrative describing the non-salary budget items should accompany the budget form. Project activities can occur year-round but the stipend will be paid during the summer months, unless the applicants make special arrangements.

Review Process
The application deadlines are 5 pm, October 15 and March 15. Applications are made directly to the council. For instructional projects, include endorsement letters in support of the project from departmental chairs and the Steans Center for Community-based Service Learning. For research projects, include letters of endorsement from community organizations or partners. If approval of the DePaul IRB is required, funds will not be released until the approval is received.

Institutional Compliance:  Management Standards Training
Completion of the Financial Affairs internal grants training workshop is mandatory for internal grant recipients and satisfies the annual Management Standards Training requirement for budget managers at DePaul.  No grant funds will be released until the recipient has completed budget manager training.  Workshop participants receive a resource guide that includes quick reference materials and a current Management Standards Handbook.  Topics include understanding chartfields, use of web authorization, use of SAHR delegation, finding and reading Mobius reports, correcting transactions, requesting budget changes, review of key compliance standards, overview of travel guidelines and eProcurement procedures, and overview of payroll guidelines. 

Final Report
Awardees are required to submit a final report within 30 days of the completion of their project. This report should describe the achievement of outcomes outlined in the proposal and the impact on students. It should include a list of community organizations that were involved in the project.  Failure to submit the report will cause the awardees to be ineligible for additional Council grants until the report is submitted.  In addition, research results should be shared with the Steans Center, which is institutionally responsible for gathering data on service learning outcomes. 

Outline of Proposal
Proposals are reviewed anonymously. Remove all personal references from the proposal before submission. All proposals must be in an editable text format.  Only the CV may be submitted in PDF format.  Researchers, who propose projects involving non-English-speaking populations, should indicate their proficiency in the target language and how they will address any required translation services.
A complete online application will include the following:

Write an abstract of not more than 10 lines. The abstract should be a summary of, rather than an introduction to, your project.

The narrative description of the project should be clear, concise and complete and should not be longer than 5 double-spaced pages in no less than 11 point font. 

Instructional projects should include:

• A description of existing course and the proposed changes, if the project is a revision of an existing course
• The significance of the public service experience in the course
• A preliminary outline of the course, including a description of the course content, the public service experience, and how classroom learning will be integrated with service-learning. This section should include a description of the kinds of preparation students will receive before their public service experience and how their learning will be measured. A preliminary syllabus, including readings should be included as an attachment.
• A timeline for the project including other time commitments during the summer if requesting a summer stipend.

Research projects should include:

• Goals, Objectives, and Need for the Project;
• Context for their project or literature review;
• Plan of Work, including a description of how the activities will meet the goals and objectives outlined;
• Description of the outcomes and expected significance of the project.

Complete the budget form (click here to download the budget form) and write a short budget narrative.

Include letters of endorsement for the new or revised course from your department chair, or, where appropriate, your dean. Also include letters of agreement from the community service organizations with which you will be working.

Attach your most current curriculum vitae.

Any questions you may have as you prepare the proposal may be directed to the Chair of the Council or any member of the Council (see Public Service Council membership list ).