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Social Justice Action Project |
INTRODUCTION
You may or may not be aware that one of the goals of the core curriculum at Le Moyne College, and at Jesuit colleges and universities across the country, is to promote among students a good understanding of and commitment to social justice (see College mission statement on syllabus). The reason for this is that they want graduates who are committed to the common good, not just their own goods. Educating whole persons for solidarity with others is one of the hallmarks of Jesuit education. Since this course is a part of the core curriculum, we will explore the concept of social justice in hopes of working toward that goal.
What is social justice? There is a substantive view of social justice that underlies the Catholic and Jesuit tradition (which we will examine and which I hope you will come to appreciate). In this course, however, we will explore the concept of social justice more broadly, beginning with your own views on the subject. Each of you brings with you some ideas about what a just society looks or does not look like and I want to begin with your own beliefs and assumptions about social justice. I want to provide opportunity for you to explore what your view is even if it is not fully articulated, how you came to the view you did, and what, if any, affect it has had on your behavior thus far.
But I would not fulfill my responsibility as an educator if we left it there. David Kolb, a learning psychologist, argues that deep learning is about "bringing out the learner’s beliefs and theories, examining and testing them, and then integrating the new, more refined ideas into the person’s belief systems" (Experiential Learning, 28). That is why one of the objectives for this course (and this project) is "to enable students to develop a more sophisticated understanding of social justice." In this course, you will have opportunity to explore not only your own view, but also to compare and contrast it with the views of others (students, community leaders, writers, etc.) as a way to broaden and deepen your perspective.
There is more. Parker Palmer, a noted educator and scholar, has argued recently that there is an intricate connection between epistemology (how we know what we know), ethics (values and beliefs that shape our behavior), and pedagogy. The relationship of the knower (you and me) to the known (the subject of social justice) becomes the basis for the relationship of the actor (again, you and me) to the world (the place where justice is and is not present). How we approach the subject of social justice affects how we understand and do social justice. This relational aspect, therefore, has implications for the teaching and learning (pedagogy) in this class. It is not enough to learn about social justice through readings and discussions; we must act on it in ways large and small, and analyze our actions and the reasons for them in a public context. This is why I have labeled this project "social justice action." Through the dialectical process of action and reflection (what many call "praxis"), there is the possibility of generating a deeper learning of and commitment to social justice than mere abstract discussions of social justice theories can do alone.
The action serves an additional purpose. At the end of this course, I want us to have a more sophisticated understanding of ourselves as moral agents. What I mean is that I want us to understand that our views, beliefs, and perspectives on social justice affect our actions. Justice or injustice doesn't just happen to us. Our actions (or inaction) contribute to the possibilities we have to experience social justice in our lives and in our communities. We have more power to make a just society than we think. Through this social justice action project I hope you get a sense of that power through the small contributions you will make.
WHAT WILL YOU DO?
The social justice action project has several components that develop your skills in critical thinking, research, presentation, action, and reflection. The project may be done alone or in small groups of 2-4 students. However, if you do the project in small groups, each student must submit her/his own reflection papers (one at the beginning and one at the end--see details in assignments that follow).
The first component is the social justice action. This activity calls for analyzing a social justice problem and taking appropriate action to try to address it. During the course, we will look at a variety of social issues that result in injustice and oppression for some group or groups. You may become aware of such a problem locally (on campus or in Syracuse area) or globally (national or international). The focus of this activity is on what your awareness of the problem is and the actions you take to address it. (For example, prior students focused on such issues as affordable housing, domestic violence, and poverty wages. Their actions reflected their issues: working with Habitat for Humanity, raising money for a local shelter for abused women and conducting a living wage campaign on campus.) This is not merely action, but it is informed action, so it has a research component, a strategic component, and an action component. Yet you must commit a minimum of 10 hours this semester to the action part of this project (you must keep an individual log of time spent on the action you did).
The second component is the class presentation of the social justice issue and action. The format for the presentation is left up to the presenter (s) to decide, but you may do so in conjunction with the professor. This might include a presentation and discussion on the selected topic, a group dramatic or visual arts display, a simulation game, or readings/discussions of group members. The purpose is to get the class to think critically (and possibly acting) about the issue you address. It would be up to the presenter (s) to gather reading materials for distribution, placed on reserve, or linked on-line. I would be glad to help whenever possible. I will distribute a sign-up sheet for presentation dates.
The final component of this activity is the written analysis of the research and action that you did on the social justice issue. This is a formal written report that explains what was done and why it was done. Your written analysis should lay out your research on the issue, develop the ethical reasoning that shaped your perspective on this issue, detail the actions that you took, suggest what the impact of your action was, and reflect on what you learned about this issue and about social justice from the experience. A draft of this written analysis is due for peer review on Tuesday, April 26 (These will be distributed through Canvas under Assignments: Social Justice Action).
The following is a list of the tasks to be performed and due dates for the successful completion of this project:
Assignment 1: Reflection Paper (What is social justice?) – February 4
In a 2-4 page thought piece, please answer the following questions: What is "social justice"? What does it look like? What makes up a just society? How does your conception of social justice differ from other views of which you are aware? Do you ever act in ways that promote social justice? If so, what kinds of social justice actions do you engage in? (An alternative way of getting at this is to ask yourself what you consider unjust or unfair. How do you know injustice when you see it? Then think about what it would take to eliminate the injustice. This will get you thinking about what justice is.)
Assignment 2: Project Description – February 23
Develop a 2- page description of what you will be doing. There are several ways to get at what social justice action you would like to work on. One way is to look locally, nationally, or internationally and discover a problem that you really think is unfair. You can draw these from class but you don’t have to. For example, do you think that it is unfair that people who work full-time still earn poverty wages? If so, then there are a variety of groups that are seeking to promote a living wage for all people. You could join a living wage campaign. In this brief paper, you should decide what the problem is, why it is a problem (what values or beliefs does this state of affairs violate for you?), and then discern what you hope to do about it (what actions you will engage in).
Assignment 3: Annotated Bibliography – March 4
Develop a bibliography of books, articles, web sites, etc., from which that you will draw to research the issue you want to address in your action. An annotated bibliography means that you will briefly describe what the source offers on the issue you address. It is important in this assignment to be broad in terms of your sources. What I mean is that you want to consider perspectives different from your own. Your research should include the facts related to the issue, but also the ethical and moral arguments for and against your view. For example, if you are looking at the issue of living wages, you want to be sure to include factual evidence in support of and against them. In addition, you want to consider the justice reasons some people who want a living wage offer and those of people who think a living wage might create more problems than resolution (click here for examples of annotated bibliographies).
Assignment 4: Class Presentation (See description above for activity and dates).
Assignment 5: First Drafts (Peer Review) – April 26
You should submit a polished draft of your written analysis for peer review on Canvas under Assignments (I will also review it and provide feedback). Each person in the class will have a partner who will review your paper. The paper should follow the format suggested above. You should state clearly the issue you hoped to address, why you chose this issue, the research you did on this issue, the moral reasoning that supports your view and your action, and what you learned from the experience. Here again the paper should entertain other perspectives even though you ultimately may disagree with some (or all) of what they say. The reader should be able to detect a clear progression in your reasoning from the factual, to the moral/ethical reasoning, to the action you take to address it. In your draft, be sure to indicate what you still need to include in your essay so the reader has a good indication of where you are going.
Please note that the more complete the draft, the better the quality of feedback your partner and I can provide you. My experience suggests that students who put effort into the draft generate a better final product.
Assignment 6: Final Written Analysis – May 10
The final paper should take the feedback provided on the draft (and from your presentation) and weave all of the strands into a clear, concise, and thorough analysis of the issue you have sought to address in your social justice project. Remember to be thorough in terms of your sources and your arguments. While you cannot include everything, the analysis should be broad enough to demonstrate to the reader that you have a clear grasp of the issue and a good understanding of social justice.
Provide a detailed accounting of your action, how much time it took (a minimum of 10 hours), why you selected this action as opposed to some other, how the action affected you, the responses you received to your action, and what impact you think your action had. One of the goals of this project is to enable you to gain a better sense of yourself as a moral agent. Reflections on your action can contribute toward achievement of this goal. (Be sure to attach the log sheet that documents the time you put into the actions themselves. For groups, each member should have her/his own log sheet.)
Pay careful attention also to what you learned about social justice at the end of this essay. Recall that a primary goal of this assignment is to enable students to develop a more sophisticated view of social justice. How did this project enable you to develop a better sense of what social justice is? What components of the project were most helpful: the research, the action, the feedback, your own reflections, all of these? If you did not deepen your sense of social justice, why do you think this was the case? What elements of the project got in your way? Or was there something missing?
HOW THE PROJECT WILL BE EVALUATED
The primary focus of this project is the learning you do about social justice. Ultimately the success of the project will be evaluated by how well you meet the goals intended for the project. But because I must submit a grade, and most of you care deeply about your grades, I have to translate your success into some letter grade. The first three assignments (the reflection paper on social justice, the description of the project, and the annotated bibliography) will not be graded but will receive points for the quality of effort you put into these assignments. The maximum amount of points for each assignment is five (5). These points will be added to the final grade for the social justice action project. If you turn these assignments in late, the maximum amount of points you can earn is three (3). If you fail to turn in any of these assignments, the final grade for the project will be reduced (5-15 points).
The two graded components of this activity are the class presentation (30 points) and the final written analysis (50 points). The presentation will be evaluated according to the following criteria and will be conducted by the professor and classmates:
Evaluation
Criteria:
1.
Preparation. Have
you mastered the topic? Have you done sufficient research and reflection on the
topic to provide the class with a good sense of the issue you want to address?
Have you selected appropriate reading materials and distributed them in a
timely manner?
2.
Implementation. Did
the presentation go smoothly and as planned? Was there a clear sense of
connection between each component of the presentation? Did each segment of the
presentation flow into the next? Or did the presentation seem choppy or unfocused?
3.
Ability to interest
and involve the audience. Did the presenter (s) offer opportunities for the
class to become involved in the presentation? To what extent did the students
in class get involved during the presentation? How many were involved and how
intense was their involvement?
4.
Insightfulness. To
what extent were the points made (and/or generated by the discussion) points
which went beyond the obvious? Did students gain a clear sense of what you were
trying to communicate? Or did the presentation just present material students
already heard before?
The final written analysis will be evaluated according the following criteria and you may choose to include students as well as the professor in its evaluation.
Evaluation
Criteria:
1.
Overall coherence of
the project and the analysis. Was the project thought through and executed well
and does the written analysis demonstrate this? Is the purpose of the project
clear and was it appropriate for this course?
2.
Quality of the
research effort and moral reasoning. Does the written analysis demonstrate
sufficient breadth and depth on the issue addressed? Were relevant sources
reviewed and discussed? Does the analysis include other moral perspectives on
the issue and does it treat those other perspectives fairly?
3.
Logical relationship
between the research, moral reasoning, and the action. Is the research
appropriate to the action taken? Is there a thesis or perspective taken on the
issue that connects the research, moral reasoning, and action clearly so that
the reader has a good grasp of what the analysis wants to convey? Does the
action taken reflect well the social justice perspective the analysis
articulates?
4.
Insightfulness of
the observations/conclusions. Do the observations/conclusions show the sense of
social justice developed by the author and the way in which the research and
action contributed to that development? Is there a sense of what the author
learned through the experience and what contributed to or hindered that
learning?
5.
Clarity. Does the paper
have a clear sense of progression? Do the paragraphs develop the ideas and do
they build upon each other? Is there a clear thesis and conclusion and do the
intervening paragraphs provide support for them?
6.
Mechanics. Are the
grammar, spelling, sentence structure, and paragraph construction in good shape
so that they contribute to the analysis and do not confuse the reader? Are the
footnotes/endnotes sufficient? Do they provide appropriate information? Does
the bibliography or reference page follow proper format?
The final grade for the social justice action project will be the average of the grades received on the class presentation and the written analysis adjusted by the points earned on the other assignments. If you do this activity as a group, you will receive a group grade for the presentation. The bulk of the written analysis--the research, the moral reasoning, description of the actions--may be in common. Each member of the group, however, must write her/his own reflections on the activity itself, impact of the project on your view of social justice, etc. (click here for details about this reflective piece) and place it on Canvas (Assignments).
Let me emphasize that the point of this activity is to work on a project that draws from the values you hold or are developing. This project does not preclude any social justice issue or perspective on it. The key to doing well on this activity is that you develop your own sense of social justice and reflect on how the experience of engaging in action helps to shape and deepen your view on what justice is in that context. Doing well on this assignment is not contingent on you saying what you think I want to hear. Rather, doing well means that you deepen your own sense of what social justice is and act in ways that are consistent (at least as consistent as possible) with that view. It is imperative that you do develop your position in relationship with other, contrasting views. This is what higher education is all about: taking seriously the viewpoints of others. But it does not necessarily mean that you adopt those other views. It means you appreciate those other views while demonstrating good reasons for disagreeing.