Bonner Love: Reflections on a Cross-College, Cross-Community Partnership

• In Event: 61.061 - Communities as Central Places of Preservice Teacher Learning

Abstract

The director of a campus Bonner Scholars program and an Education Studies professor offer reflections on a growing partnership that integrates a community cultural wealth model of service learning (Yosso, 2006) with anti-racist teacher education. Working at a PWI in a city with an ongoing history of racism and segregation, 30-years of refugee resettlement, and immigrant communities representing more than 100 language groups, maintain a growing, mutually informed partnership across campus and across local communities. Their partnership began with shared students and a mutual recognition of values: centering what Yosso (2006) describes as “the array of cultural knowledge, skills, abilities and contacts possessed by marginalized groups” (p.1) and challenging the performance and maintenance of Whiteness through ongoing cross-curricular, community-involved experiences (Picower, 2009). From that recognition, a partnership grew in which the work of the college’s 60 Bonner Scholars, who together contribute more than 24,000 service hours in local communities each year, provides a path for pre-service teachers to work with immigrant children in their home communities, participate in cultural competence training led by community members, and get to know community leaders. In turn, the Education Studies Department now offers training for site leaders, academic support, and sends skilled tutors to the sites. As the partnership moves beyond its initial commitments to create a new community immersion program for pre-service teachers, the presenters reflect on the ways they rely on ongoing conversation, mutual support, and sharing a vision and values to continue their work.

Author

• Anna Bost Pennell, Guilford College