Connecting Muncie Neighborhood partners and resources
Working with the FDA’s Farmers Food Box program and Purdue Extension during the pandemic, CERES Affiliated Faculty Joshua Gruver, Associate Professor of Environment, Geology, and Natural Resources, is helping Hoosiers in need by providing free food sourced from Indiana diary producers. Dr. Gruver and the Muncie Food Hub have been taking milk that would have been dumped and giving it away for free. Watch Josh’s interview on Fox 59.
Ball State University Alumni magazine recapped the recent immersive learning work of CERES Affiliated Faculty Sanglim Yoo, Assistant Professor of Urban Planning. Funded by Provost Immersive Learning grants, Dr. Yoo has led student teams in analyzing the potential of brownfields in Delaware and Grant Counties as sites for solar farms and in assessing and improving economic sustainability efforts in Muncie. These projects also allow students to improve their skills in using socioeconomic and demographic data and the geographic information system (GIS) mapping tool. Read more on the BSU Alumni Magazine’s website!
Congratulations to the Whitely Community Council’s Ken Hudson and Frank Scott, as well as Ball State Associate Professor Kiesha Warren-Gordon (Criminal Justice) for their recently published article in the Journal of Community Engagement and Higher Education! “Voices of Partnership within the Critical Service-Learning Framework” discusses how community partners can be involved in all states of the critical service learning process, including course planning and collaborative research.
ABSTRACT:
Over the course of the past three decades, service learning has become a major component in higher education. Heretofore, however, there has been no published research that focuses on the community partner or that assesses the role of the community partner within the community-service-learning (CSL) model. This paper fills that gap by focusing on the community partner relationship as delineated by Mitchell (2008), the community partner’s position in CSL, and the authentic relationships between the community partner, class, and instructor. Specifically, we address the following question: How do community partners articulate their voices within the CSL framework? This paper argues that community partners may articulate their own voices and concerns through the use of autoethnography, as well as through involvement in all stages of the CSL process, including course-planning and subsequent collaborative scholarship.
In the Spring 2020 Semester, the Virginia Ball Center for Creative Inquiry hosted an amazing program allowing students with the BSU English Department in partnership with the Muncie Arts and Culture Council to explore the “makers” movement becoming increasingly popular in our cities. The investigation covered some of the cool makerspaces here in Muncie and culminated in a large enough collection of stories and data for 2 print books – a compilation of oral histories and a collection of photo essays featuring stories of Muncie makers. Learn more at the website for the project on the Virginia B. Ball Center for Creative Inquiry’s site, and check out these other awesome resources!
Project Website | Seminar Facebook Page | Interactive Map of Muncie & Surrounding Area Makerspaces
Faculty Mentor: Laura Romano
Department: English
Community Partner: Muncie Arts and Culture Council
Student Team: Stressca Nathaniel, Tamera Sims, Jack Satter, Elizabeth Baum, Mason Killebrew, Jessica Snow, Andrew (Drew) Catalano, Halie Wills, Sarah Morrow, Laura Romano, Darrin Sims, Elizabeth Riester, Hannah (Cali) Fehr
PHOTO provided by the Anthony Northside Neighborhood Association
The stone gateway at the entrance to the Wheeling Park Addition at Wheeling/Cowing and another remaining stone boundary post on Wheeling are the last standing structures in Muncie born of the generosity of Harriett B. Anthony.
In April 2019 the Anthony-Northside Neighborhood Association (ANNA) discovered these monuments were in the path of the city’s planned reconstruction of Wheeling Avenue. A mad scramble was made to find the funding and resources to save the historic gates. With the help of numerous state and local organizations including Ball State’s College of Architecture and Planning, Indiana Landmarks, the Muncie Board of Works, and the Federal Highway Administration funds were eventually allocated for the Indiana Department of Transportation to remove the iconic brickwork and return them to their original locations once the Wheeling project completes.
Read the whole story and see more photos of the project on ANNA’s website!
Students in Geography 341 (Cartography and Visualization of Spatial Data) partnered with the Muncie Visitors Bureau to produce visual materials that promote Muncie attractions to area visitors. Students collected and organized data during the semester and explored possible map designs for both print brochures and interactive online applications. Guides on restaurants and breweries, Muncie pop culture, the Garfield trail, and the Bob Ross experience are just some of the pieces completed by the students.
Faculty Mentor: Jörn Seemann
Department: Geography
Community Partner: Muncie Visitors Bureau
Student Team: Alyssa Bilbrey, Jarrett Braden, William Cape, Dan Council, Becca Garrett, Nathan Gidley, Elante Ingram, Jamie Johnson, Benjamin Lutz, Riley Mccreary, Ben Meyer, Jordan Verdeyen, Clay Zeigler