I’m interested in learning specifically about…Caritas: Service Learning, Global Perspectives, and Social Justice and Inclusivity. Can any students give some insight? I know that students in the LC dorm together but what else should I know before joining? The specific “vibe” of each one? Specific experiences? Any problems in the recent past?
I participated in the Leadership Learning Community. Leadership is a rather popular one, however I know of people having great experiences in every community. You have to take a 1 credit seminar that meets once a week (for an hour 15) and do activities, projects, and learn about your topic. But this work is not rigorous, trust me it’s busy work if anything but I learned some interesting things from Leadership.
One thing I did NOT know, was that your learning community is tied to your Augustine Culture Seminar (Freshmen 2 semester course titled ACS, at its basic state it’s a reading and writing class but takes inspiration from your learning community topic, so in your case you’d be doing actual coursework and readings on Social Justice, or Global Perspectives if that were your community). So yes, you take the 1 credit learning community seminar in addition to the ACS seminar, these 2 classes work in conjunction a little bit and are more of an extension of each other (don’t worry they aren’t bad).
So since you see the same group of students in your ACS seminar, the 1 credit learning community class, and in your dorm, I do feel I know that group significantly better than the classmates in my other classes. So the LC does help you get to know a few familiar faces on campus to wave to.
I did a day trip with my seminar with the other leadership students into Philadelphia, I believe the other communities do this too. But I believe Caritas is the most active with projects and actually doing stuff (correct me if I’m wrong!). I’ve heard Environmental Leadership is interesting as people are very passionate about environmentalism so they enjoy the work! The Art and Culture community is rather fun. Service is something students tend to get passionate about and enjoy, so I know Caritas is a community people like because of this.
There is also a learning community for Sophomores that is service based so you may enjoy that one too if Caritas is of interest.