Courses

Engaged Scholarship Courses (ESCH)

The Lang Center works with faculty and the Registrar’s Office to designate certain courses as Engaged Scholarship, or “ESCH” courses. Swarthmore College identifies ESCH courses as those that: address a contemporary issue of pressing public concern; build knowledge about how to ameliorate social problems; produce work that engages with various publics and/or includes a community-based learning component.

Some Engaged Scholarship courses include Community-Based Learning (CBL), a pedagogical approach that asserts profound learning often comes from experience that is supported by guidance, context, foundational knowledge, and intellectual analysis. The opportunity for students to bring thoughtful knowledge and ideas based on personal observation and social interaction to a course's themes and scholarly arguments brings depth to the learning experience for individuals and to the content of the course. The communities of which we are a part can benefit from the resources of our faculty and students, while the courses can be educationally transformative in powerful ways.

ESCH Course Highlights

Students participating in a Lang Center workshop.

Introduction to Engaged Scholarship (PEAC 009)
Brings together students interested in connecting their academics with action to explore and promote ethical intelligence, active yet reflective civic engagement, and innovative solutions to pressing social problems.

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Students in discussion.

Sanctuary (ENGL 079P)
Explore the various political, institutional, and cultural understandings of sanctuary as they relate to such topics as: race and ethnicity; gender and sexuality; health and wellness; war and militarism. 

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Students in discussion.

Art and Culture of Indigenous Philadelphia: From Shackamaxon to the Present (ARTH 061/ENVS 056)
Examine the visual and material histories of Indigenous communities, artists, and leaders of present-day Philadelphia and its surrounding ancestral territories, from pre-contact to the present.

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Swarthmore students and faculty join Chester community leaders at incinerator protest.

Environmental Justice: Ethnography, Politics, Action (ENVS 035, SOAH 035)
Analyze “sustainability” in different cultural and urban contexts, investigate the challenges of implementing sustainability initiatives, explore the promise of urban areas, and learn from grassroots leaders.

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