How to Make Your Public-Service Project More Successful!
Co-sponsor: Sally Susnowitz, Director, MIT Public Service Center
Class Description
What did you do last summer? What did you learn?
Sumita and Aline worked at a community health clinic in Peru,
visiting elderly patients in impoverished neighborhoods.
Jerry went to Honduras, where he installed equipment in
a river to see if the US-owned mine nearby was
poisoning it. Susan joined an AIDS-education project in
Belize, working with kids & HIV+ patients. Ashley & Kay
spent 8 weeks in Arizona supporting Navajo elders in
their fight to preserve a sustainable way of life in
the face of pressure from corporations & the government.
All these MIT students wanted to do public service, &
their efforts were funded by MIT, but will their
projects actually have lasting benefits for the
communities they intended to serve?
Students combining research & public service must
achieve both understanding & positive change. We will
talk with students, activists, faculty, & funders about
how a project can be designed to maximize the chances of
success. If you have done public service, or want to,
please join us!
Our guest-list includes Prof. Jean Jackson (MIT
Anthropology); Prof. Jeff Ravel (MIT History); Prof.
Chappell Lawson (MIT Political Science); Prof. Tom Cummins
(art historian and Director of the David Rockefeller Center
for Latin American Studies at Harvard University); Kasey
Davis (Cambridge School Volunteers); Michael Bergren (MIT
Eloranta Committee); Prof. Ted Macdonald (Associate Director
of the Program on Nonviolent Sanctions and Cultural Survival
at Harvard); Paul Parravano (MIT President's Office & MIT
Community Service Fund); & you.
Schedule (IAP 2004)
This seminar will meet twice, on Tuesday, January 20 and Tuesday, January 27,
from 3 pm to 5 pm, in PDR 1 & 2 on the 3rd floor of the MIT Student Center.
We prefer that you attend both sessions, but you are welcome to join us for either one.
To help us make adequate arrangements, please let us know
before January 18 if you are planning to attend.
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