The Mellon Grant objectives are to:

• Increase participation in experiential education across all student groups;
• Strengthen faculty engagement with experiential learning for the mutual benefit of students, faculty, and staff;
• Develop a long-term vision for the evolution of the K-Plan and its components of career development, civic engagement, and study abroad;
• Cultivate a clearer understanding and increased capacity to communicate about the K-Plan across multiple audiences;
• Provide training in design thinking and beyond.

Grant applicants should be aware that throughout the past year, three project implementation groups have been developing and piloting K Plan innovations that emerged from the design thinking work done with IA Collaborative in 2018.   These are:

• “Articulated tracks” that offer curricular and co-curricular pathways for collaboration on “grand challenges,” connecting with existing K curricular components such as Shared Passages and the SIP
• The development of a digital navigation tool students use to organize, reflect on, and represent their K-Plan
• Credit bearing, faculty-led study away opportunities that offer:
  • Scalable classes that offer flexibility of class length and span
  • Partial experiential learning credits.

These teams are guided by commitments to create projects that:

• connect/intersect in some way with all three Centers (CIP, CCPD, CCE)
• include the testing of assumptions about access to high-impact practices for all students
• contribute to the re-envisioning and/or integration of elements of the K-Plan
• actively promote student agency, including in the project’s design and implementation, and draw upon knowledge and leadership in the diverse communities where we work and learn.

Moreover, the Experiential Education Committee has conducted research and developed a white paper responding to the design thinking recommendation that we formalize and streamline the processes by which credit is given to faculty and students for experiential learning.