Foreword

Michigan State University is a community of scholars dedicated to advancing knowledge through its discovery, application, dissemination, and preservation.

Throughout its 150-year history, the University has been deeply committed to public scholarship, working collaboratively with community partners to solve socially significant problems. MSU faculty and staff are engaged in scholarship-focused outreach activities throughout the world. Some are engaged through community-based applied research and evaluation, through technical assistance and consulting, or through partnerships with agencies, organizations, and communities. Some extend their teaching to nontraditional students at off-campus sites or by technology-delivered distance education. Some provide clinical services. Many engage their students by incorporating service-learning and other civic engagement opportunities into their courses. Others develop and curate managed-learning environments, exhibitions, and demonstrations. All share a common commitment to public scholarship, working collaboratively with community partners to address issues of public concern within the context of the University's mission.

The Engaged Scholar features vignettes that illustrate the breadth and depth of MSU's engagement with society. The Engaged Scholar is a story book, containing adventurous tales of university-community partnerships that enhance experiential learning opportunities for students, that enrich community, economic and family life, that increase and diversify opportunities for research and creative activities, that expand the University's reach throughout the world, and that engage society in the process of its own transformation. Civic engagement, public scholarship, campus-community partnerships—these are the hallmarks of the land-grant university in the 21st century and of the engaged scholar.

Sincerely,

Hiram E. Fitzgerald
Associate Provost for University Outreach and Engagement