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DU Home > News & Events > Media Releases > October 2006

MEDIA RELEASES

Contact
Jessica Mackinnon
jmack@dom.edu
(708) 524-6289

Dominican named as finalist for award

Dominican University, in partnership with San Miguel Schools, has been named as one of three finalists for the Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter Partnership Award for Campus-Community Collaboration. The university and its community partner will be publicly recognized by Rosalynn Carter during the Campus Compact 20th anniversary gala at the Hyatt Regency McCormick Place on October 16. The program honors universities and community groups that collaborate to improve their communities.

The ongoing partnership between Dominican University and San Miguel Schools of Chicago, advances the educational missions of both institutions. Through the partnership, San Miguel Schools are provided with volunteer tutors, teacher training and in-service workshops in reading and special education, and Dominican University students, staff and faculty receive invaluable service learning opportunities. San Miguel teachers also benefit from tuition scholarships to continue their educations at the university.

“We are proud to receive this very important recognition of our work because it is so representative of the university’s core commitment to service,” said Donna Carroll, president of Dominican University.

“Our partnership with Dominican University is invaluable to the students and families we serve. Together we are transforming the Austin and Back-of-the-Yards communities of Chicago,” said Brother Ed Siderewicz, president of San Miguel Schools.

San Miguel Schools, sponsored by the De LaSalle Christian Brothers, are dedicated to providing a high quality, progressive education to youth in Chicago’s most disadvantaged neighborhoods. The original school, founded in 1995, serves 80 sixth through eighth-grade students in the predominantly Latino Back-of-the-Yards neighborhood on Chicago’s south side. The second school, opened in 2002, serves over 100 fifth through eighth grade students in the predominantly African-American Austin neighborhood on the west side.

Dominican University, located in the affluent suburb of River Forest just west of Chicago, launched its first collaboration with San Miguel’s Gary Comer Campus in the Austin neighborhood in 2003. In an innovative oral history project, San Miguel students, working with Dominican University student mentors, interviewed Austin residents about their lives and the history of their neighborhood.

Last year, the university developed a program, funded through an Illinois Campus Compact fellowship, which allowed students at the Back-of-the-Yards school to create personal Web pages exploring diversity, culture and community. In addition, through a university-sponsored diversity grant, Dominican faculty, staff and students joined with San Miguel faculty and staff in a workshop which explored ways of addressing the problems of racism within and outside both institutions.

To date, Dominican University students have volunteered nearly 2,000 hours of service in San Miguel classrooms and summer camps. In addition, the university has hosted San Miguel students on campus for social and educational programs. Of the 31 university courses that now include a service-learning component, approximately 25% use San Miguel as the site of their work.

“Through this partnership our students are given the opportunity—an opportunity which they might not otherwise have—to gain skills and knowledge about civic engagement. Hopefully this will lead them to practice greater involvement in their own communities after they leave the university,” said MaDonna Thelen, Dominican University’s director of service learning.

Founded in 1901, Dominican University is a comprehensive, coeducational Catholic institution offering bachelor’s and master’s degrees. Dominican offers 50 undergraduate academic programs through the Rosary College of Arts and Sciences and 17 graduate programs through the Graduate School of Library and Information Science, the Brennan School of Business, the School of Education, the Graduate School of Social Work, and the Institute for Adult Learning. In the 2007 issue of America’s Best Colleges, U.S. News & World Report again ranked Dominican University in the top tier of Midwest master’s level universities and as a “best value” for the ninth consecutive year.