The University of Michigan has long included public engagement in its educational mission, aiming to reinvest its resources in the communities it serves. Such engagement also contributes to the University’s Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) strategic plan by increasing awareness and access among underserved populations in the state of Michigan.

Medicine and literature seem like fields that couldn’t juxtapose each other more. One is a science, systematically transforming testable hypotheses about the human body into diagnoses, into clinical practice, into treatments; whereas the other is an art, expressing experiences and feelings through the written word.

What makes a place, a place? That is the question that the Great Lakes, Arts, Cultures and Environments (GLACE) program is engaging students with through the interdisciplinary humanities program.

The University of Michigan-Flint has been selected by the Carnegie Foundation as one of the 119 U.S. colleges and universities to receive the Carnegie Community Engagement Classification in 2020, an elective designation that indicates an institutional commitment to community engagement.

SMTD’s sponsorship of frequent public performances already make it one of U-M’s most outward-facing units, but many students seek to make more of an impact. “So many of our students seek to be ‘artist/citizens’ whose work makes a difference,” says SMTD Dean David Gier.

Leaders from top universities, foundations, and research organizations convened at Rackham to exchange ideas on the future of the graduate student experience.

Conversations are something we traditionally view as purely within the realm of human-human interactions, but what if you could have a conversation with someone inhuman, and it could be equally, if not more, fruitful and enjoyable?

Late on a Monday night in a modest classroom with a grand piano, staff-lined chalkboards, and a steady stream of faint melodies from adjacent music rooms coursing into the space, students rearrange desks into a circle to initiate a discussion on how to approach their art through the lens of community engagement and social action.

Can grocery delivery improve the health of pregnant women? Are neighborhood entrepreneurship programs increasing economic mobility for low-income Detroiters? What role could a modern greenhouse play in expanding the ancient African art of bead-making in Detroit?