Assistant Professor of Spanish A. Renee Gutiérrez and Assistant Professor of Criminology & Criminal Justice Studies Connie Koski have teamed up with the ICA Farmville Immigration Detention Facility in a collaborative project that will provide Longwood students an exciting experiential service-learning opportunity in the local community during the 2014-2015 academic year. In an expansion of a projected begun last year by
Dr. Gutiérrez, students will have the ability to choose to volunteer in one of two roles: they will either assist native speakers of other languages learn English and/or participate in a Conversation Café as a language partner. This project is open to all Longwood University students, and offers class project credit to students in Dr. Gutiérrez’s Spanish classes and Dr. Koski’s Introduction to Policing and Introduction to Corrections courses. This collaborative experience seeks to increase student motivation and augment learning outcomes in both the diversity and foreign language General Education goals. The professors also hope the experience will promote the development of more tolerant student attitudes toward issues of race and ethnicity in general, and those surrounding controversial issue of immigration and immigration enforcement and detention specifically. Lastly, this collaboration will provide ongoing research opportunities for both students and the faculty involved.
Filed under: English & Modern Languages, Faculty News Notes, Sociology, Anthropology, & Criminal Justice Studies