Community Problems Need Community Solutions: Feminist Collaboration Across Campuses to Create Transformative Outcomes Through Community Engaged Learning

Abstract

This study presents a multi-institutional engaged pedagogy project responding to college food insecurity that involved partnerships among students, instructors, and campus food pantries from three U.S. universities. Through analysis of pre- and post-class surveys, class assignments, and instructor and community partner reflections, we argue that our feminist collaborative approach resulted in transformative outcomes in three areas: (a) heads, as the collaboration enabled critical understandings of food insecurity and how to combat it; (b) hearts, as the collaboration fostered a culture of care and (re)ignited shared passion in doing change work, and (c) hands, as the collaboration inspired actions to address the issue. This paper showcases how incorporating feminist collaborative ethics in community-engaged learning can result in meaningful, transformative outcomes for faculty, students, and community partners.