Creating a culture of civic engagement and nonprofit careers

Here's a statement that students and career counselors at City College should keep in mind:

"The bottom line is this: nonprofits deserve recognition as a major source of employment in this country."

That quote comes from "Nonprofits are small business employers too" that you can find on the blog of Commongood Careers at
http://www.cgcareers.org/blog/comments/nonprofits_are_small_business_employers_too/
Commongood Careers is a Boston-based, for-profit search firm that helps non-profits attract and retain employees.

While there are programs in service learning and mentorship at City College, plus a new civic engagement center sponsored by the Vice Chancellor of Student Development, Mark Robinson, these programs are not able to involve more than a very small percentage of students at City College. Without greater financial resources -- and an institutional recognition of and commitment to civic engagement -- City College students most likely will not become engaged in their community or seek out careers with nonprofits. What can we do to overcome these lost opportunities?

First, we should confer with other educational institutions about how their programs for civic engagement and nonprofit work experience are handled: what resources are devoted to these programs, how many students are served, do the nonprofits in the community feel a connection to the community college, are new ways to take on issues and problems in social service delivery being developed by community college programs?

In the Bay Area, De Anza College has an Institute of Community and Civic Engagement (see http://www.deanza.edu/communityengagement/). San Francisco State University's Urban Institute, while no longer operating as a research center on civic issues, could provide some important feedback on what works and what does not in an educational setting.

We should also seek out assistance from the Community College National Center for Community Engagement at Arizona's Mesa Community College (see http://www.mc.maricopa.edu/other/engagement/)

With 9,000 nonprofits in the Bay Area that could benefit from involvement of the 250,000 community college students in our region and that could offer employment to many of these students, City College should embrace civic engagement as a core institutional value.