Carnegie's Community Engagement Classification: Intentions and Insights

Over the last few years, the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching has engaged in a comprehensive re-examination of its traditional classification system. The redesign stemmed from a concern about the inadequacy of the classification for representing institutional similarities and differences and its insensitivity to the evolution of higher education. In December 2006, the foundation announced the inaugural selection of 76 U. S. colleges and universities to be newly classified as "institutions of community engagement," the first of a set of elective classifications intended to broaden the categorization of colleges and universities. Of those 76 institutions, most reported the kind of impact described in the opening quotations. The enthusiastic response to the new classification signaled the eagerness of institutions to have their community engagement acknowledged with a national and publicly recognized classification. (author)