The Honor Roll is part of the Corporation for
National and Community Service’s strategic commitment to engage
millions of college students in service and celebrate the critical
role of higher education in strengthening communities.
“Millikin University has long been committed to community service as
an essential component of our educational mission,” said Millikin
University President Dr. Patrick E. White. “As our mission states,
Millikin students, faculty, staff, and alumni are committed to
performing democratic citizenship in a global environment and acting
out lives of meaning and value. Millikin is proud to be named to the
President’s Higher Education Community Service Honor Roll.”
More than 760 higher education institutions were named to the 2014
President’s Higher Education Community Service Honor Roll. CNCS has
administered the award since 2006 in collaboration with the U.S.
Department of Education and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban
Development, as well as the American Council on Education, Campus
Compact, and the Interfaith Youth Core.
During the 2012-2013 academic year, Millikin students engaged in
148,416 hours of service to the community, this includes service
from curricular and co-curricular programs. Millikin was recognized
for the following initiatives.
This past academic year, approximately 500 Millikin first-year
students completed a variety of service projects, beginning with
participation in the local United Way’s Day of Action during
Millikin’s First Week program.
Many classes developed a semester project that related to a course
topic and collaborated with a community partner. Projects included:
tutoring at after school programs and in elementary schools, working
with seniors in nursing homes, a theatre production for kindergarten
students, serving the Illinois Raptor Center, participating in the
Decatur Community Food Drive, increasing the adoptability of dogs at
an animal shelter, and many more.
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One of the standout service-learning projects this past year
was with Dennis Elementary School, a Decatur Public School near
Millikin’s campus which is now a Millikin Lab School. Millikin
provided land to help the school start an organic garden. The
“learning garden” has become a great opportunity for Millikin
students to work alongside students in grades K-6 to make the
garden a success. Numerous Millikin traditions and events
include service components such as Homecoming, Greek Week, and Fall
Family Weekend. Service components are also included in Millikin’s
residential learning communities where students participate in at
least 10 hours of service a semester. Millikin’s athletic teams also
volunteer in the Decatur community, primarily working with Special
Olympics and the Good Samaritan Inn soup kitchen, and also serving
in other ways that meet community needs.
President White added, “This recognition affirms what we long have
performed. Millikin faculty, staff, alumni and students are
committed to serving the Decatur and Macon County community, the
vitality of which depends on imagination, service, and hard work by
all of us.”
The Corporation for National and Community Service is a federal
agency that engages more than five million Americans in service
through Senior Corps, AmeriCorps, the Social Innovation Fund, and
Volunteer Generation Fund, and leads President Obama’s national call
to service initiative, United We Serve. Through the agency’s Segal
AmeriCorps Education Award Matching Program, CNCS gives education
institutions access to tens of thousands of AmeriCorps alumni with
millions of dollars in Segal Education Awards for tuitions and fees.
For more information, visit NationalService.gov.
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