My Garden of Thoughts: Reflection #22 -- Public Scholarship

 

https://www.insidehighered.com/advice/2019/04/11/risks-and-rewards-engaging-public-scholarship-opinion

    Public scholarships allow universities and higher education to engage with the public by bringing them unique and useful information. In the article "Public Scholarship: A Tool for Strengthening Relationships Across Extension, Campus, and Community", a public scholarship mostly involves "diverse modes of creating and circulating knowledge for and with publics and communities" (2019). This method of reaching the public came out of a need to find better ways to get financial support for higher education institutions. They have faced significant declines in support for research which has lead to less engagement with the community through public scholarships. The importance of public scholarships is that they help higher education institutions disseminate and share information with the community, which in turns give the community ways to support. This keeps universities from having to let go of many of their avenues for research because they are receiving the financial assistance that they need. If funding declines in universities, usually research and evidence-based programming are the first to go. This in turn can hurt both the university and the community since there is no longer any mutual collaboration or extension of knowledge happening.

     Making sure that community-campus programs thrive and partner together is a huge factor that keeps important research and discovery efforts alive. Both articles for this week's reading suggested ways to make universities and resources thrive mutually. One said that requiring graduate students to make an effort to form public scholarships with a community resource that is already linked to the university is a huge help. The other article mentioned how they had already started a program to promote public scholarships. It was called Promoting and Engaging in Public Scholarship (PEPS). It incorporated workshops and collaboration that would reach individuals who were "interested in science communication or outreach" (2019).

   

 These articles helped me comprehend what the requirements were for the Public Scholarship assignment due this week in our class. I think it is a bit confusing to call the dissemination of research and information from universities public scholarships. Usually the only time we hear the word scholarship is in reference to getting financial aid to pay for tuition through scholarships we apply for. Aside, from the confusing name, I do think it is an important issue to address. Universities and professor dedicate a considerable amount of their time to valuable research in their field. When they have to financial means to carry out experiments, research, and studies, it allows not only the university to benefit, but for the community to benefit as well. I will make sure my Public Scholarship reflect information that could help the community to understand how important it is to make resources that help single parents. More research that can be done for this special population will benefit all of us within the Manhattan community.

- E.