Slow Down, Be Present

How faculty help students make meaning from community-engaged learning

Person writing in a notebook
Photo by cottonbro studio: https://www.pexels.com/photo/close-up-shot-of-a-person-writing-on-a-notebook-6143818/

This is a summary of a story that originally appeared on Service Learning.

Three Duke faculty members have taken on a shared challenge: helping students slow down and make meaning from community‑engaged learning. Their methods differ, but they converge on reflection as a practice of presence rather than performance.

Katie Hyde’s “Literacy Through Photography” course pairs Duke students with elementary students in Durham Public Schools. Over the semester, students learn to pay close attention to what children notice and create. For the final reflection, Hyde moves away from a conventional essay and toward creative structure, modeling the assignment on Wallace Stevens’ poem “Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird.” By returning to specific moments instead of summarizing everything, students are prompted to decide what truly mattered. Reflection becomes intentional, rooted in lived classroom moments.

Read a poem by student Isabel Oliver here.

In Yan Liu’s course “China and the U.S. in the Age of Climate Change,” reflection helps students connect engagement to analysis. Field visits, interviews, and cross‑border dialogue are paired with the DEAL framework — Describe, Examine, and Articulate Learning – developed for community-based learning.When Liu's class interviewed Durham Academy administrators, teachers, and students, they identified a significant gap between the school’s institutional sustainability goals and how their students actually experienced them.

Adam Rosenblatt’s Death, Burial, and Justice in the Americas centers reflections on relationships. Rather than submitting isolated assignments, students select a “chosen ancestor” and write to that person throughout the semester. Through the projects, students explore care, memory, and responsibility in personal ways.

In a culture shaped by productivity, the reflections helped to get students to slow down. “We’re never just here,” a Duke student wrote after a semester reflecting on experiences working alongside community partners. “We’re always somewhere else – a ping, a scroll, a dopamine drip away.”

For the full story and tips on designing reflection that sticks, go to Service Learning.