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The Faculty and Staff Professional Development Program (FSPD) is a new Talloires Network initiative made possible by funding from the Pearson Foundation and the administrative support of Innovations in Civic Participation (ICP), a non-profit social change organization based in Washington, D.C. and co-founder of the Talloires Network.  The goal of the program is to impart to participants the technical skills and knowledge that will enable them to expand and strengthen civic engagement efforts at their universities, as well as develop strategies and methods to promote institutional policy change and quality improvement.

By addressing specific areas of focus for executives and faculty and staff, the Faculty and Staff Professional Development Program will strengthen leadership and management in higher education globally, and facilitate institutional commitment and change teaching and research as applied to civic engagement efforts:

Executive: Leadership and Management Skills and Strategy

  • Leadership of Engagement and Change – Executive, Academic Administrators
  • Engagement as Scholarship – Building faculty and staff capacity for engaged teaching, research and service
  • Evidence base for the beneficial impacts and effects of civic engagement
  • Developing key performance measures for engagement

Faculty and Staff: Best Practices, Effective Techniques, Interventions and Models

  • Engagement as scholarly work – understanding how engaged teaching and research is practiced, documented and rewarded
  • Working with communities – building partnership relationships; funding and sustaining shared work; measuring outcomes
  • Engagement as student learning and development (curricular and co-curricular); setting clear learning objectives and aligning service activities
  • Effective models for organizing and sustaining community engagement activities
  • Assessing student learning and development through engagement
  • Engaged research methods – community-based, participatory, action research, etc

The Faculty and Staff Professional Development Program will use various components to enable faculty and staff members to learn about these topics and collaborate with one another.  These include:

  • Regional meetings linked to the agendas of existing regional networks/conferences
  • On-line clearinghouse of research and articles developed in conjunction with this approach
  • Webinar modules to reinforce ideas, answer questions, and address issues of evaluation and documentation
  • Speakers bureau to develop a directory of people who have expertise and who can be dynamic and effective presenters