December 11, 2014

Lewis & Clark earns presidential honor for community service

For the third time, Lewis & Clark has been named to the President’s Higher Education Community Service Honor Roll by the Corporation for National and Community Service (CNCS). Lewis & Clark previously landed on the Honor Roll in 2010 and the Honor Roll with Distinction in 2013.

For the third time, Lewis & Clark has been named to the President’s Higher Education Community Service Honor Roll by the Corporation for National and Community Service (CNCS). Lewis & Clark previously landed on the Honor Roll in 2010 and the Honor Roll with Distinction in 2013.

The Community Service Honor Roll honors colleges and universities that reflect the values of exemplary community service and achieve meaningful outcomes in their communities. Lewis & Clark has made service a priority, creating Student Leadership and Service to give students the chance to engage, learn, and lead through ongoing and one-time serviceimmersion programs, and academic civic engagement. Also reflected in the honor are hours contributed to service in schools and mental health agencies by the Lewis & Clark Graduate School of Education and Counseling, and the work of Lewis & Clark Law School legal clinics that serve a variety of clients in the Portland area.

“Through internships, volunteer service, academic service-learning, practica, and legal clinics, students from Lewis & Clark contribute hundreds of thousands of hours of service to the community each year,” President Barry Glassner said. “We are a private institution with a public conscience and international reach, and we are a community that commits itself to diversity and sustainability as dimensions of a just society.”

Examples of Lewis & Clark’s commitment to community service include: 

  • On the undergraduate campus, one-time service days engaged more than 600 students in introductory volunteer service meant to springboard students toward deeper service and solidarity work in Portland and beyond. These service days include Campus Compact’s Martin Luther King Day of Service—which unites local colleges and universities to address educational disparities in Portland—and Spring Into Action, which sends hundreds of volunteers out to meet the community service needs of agency partners.
 
  • Forty-five student volunteers participated in alternative break programs, taking multiple days to delve deeper into key issues such as economic justice in Portland and environmental sustainability in Turks and Caicos.
 
  • More than 30 students tutored local elementary and high school students weekly, developing meaningful relationships while impacting educational access and equity concerns.
 
  • Fifteen student volunteers also served weekly with Open Meadow’s Step Up program, a program working in three Portland high schools to raise students’ GPAs and reduce dropout rates.
  • Earthrise Law Center, a public-interest legal clinic dedicated to protecting the environment. In cooperation with the National Law School of India, Earthrise is working to establish the first environmental law clinic in India. 
  • The Low-Income Taxpayer Clinic, one of many opportunities for students to gain hands-on experience while addressing community need. The LITC represents taxpayers of lesser means who find themselves facing audits, trials and hearings before the U.S. Tax Court. 
  • All students in the Lewis & Clark Graduate School of Education and Counseling complete internships and practica with local nonprofits and governmental agencies. This includes expanded partnerships between the graduate school and Portland Public Schools, which also incorporates Lewis & Clark undergraduate students into the classroom. 
  • In January 2012, the Graduate School opened the Lewis & Clark Community Counseling Center, to address community need for accessible mental health counseling. Now in its second year, the clinic has doubled in size and impact.


Student Leadership and Service More Honors