Course-embedded projects, not volunteer hours. Each one names what students hand over, what the community partner gets to keep, the skills students can put on a resume, and the reflection prompt that turns the work into learning.
K-12 school or district
Map the enrollment experience for a partner school
The need: The partner knows families drop off somewhere and can't say where.
Students hand over: A journey map, five family interviews, and one prioritized fix.
The partner keeps: A named drop-off point with evidence behind it.
Reflection prompt: Where did your assumption about the process differ from what a family described?
Your prep: One partner intro call, an interview protocol review, a 20-minute midterm check.
Intro course8 weeks
Critical thinkingInterviewingResearchVisual communication
K-12 school or district
Build the advisory-period material a school is missing
The need: Mandated advisory time with almost no material to run it with.
Students hand over: Four lesson plans, slides, and a facilitator guide teachers can reuse.
The partner keeps: A term of advisory content the school owns after the class ends.
Reflection prompt: What did you have to cut once a teacher told you how the period really runs?
Your prep: Align lessons to the school's standards, then schedule one teacher review session.
Major courseFull term
Instructional designCritical thinkingWritingFacilitation
Community nonprofit
Redesign a nonprofit's volunteer experience
The need: Volunteers show up once and never come back, and nobody has asked why.
Students hand over: An exit survey, findings brief, and a revised onboarding flow.
The partner keeps: A retention baseline and one change they can run next quarter.
Reflection prompt: Whose experience were you actually improving: the volunteer's or the staff's?
Your prep: Approve the survey instrument and set the IRB or exempt-use expectation up front.
Major course8 weeks
Survey designCritical thinkingService designData analysis
Community nonprofit
Produce a partner's first real impact report
The need: The partner has years of activity and no document a funder would read.
Students hand over: An eight-page impact report with charts, quotes, and a methods note.
The partner keeps: A grant-ready document they can send the week the class ends.
Reflection prompt: Which number felt persuasive but couldn't survive a funder's follow-up question?
Your prep: Set the data-honesty standard early and review the methods note before release.
Major course8 weeks
Data storytellingWritingCritical thinkingDesign
Campus office or program
Audit access to a campus service students avoid
The need: Usage is low and the office assumes it's awareness, not friction.
Students hand over: A findings brief with sample size, drop-off points, and one recommendation.
The partner keeps: Evidence the office can take to a budget conversation.
Reflection prompt: What barrier turned out to be about dignity rather than logistics?
Your prep: Negotiate data access with the office before week one.
Major course8 weeks
ResearchCritical thinkingInterviewingPolicy analysis
Community nonprofit
Build the small tool a partner keeps asking for
The need: Intake, scheduling, or reporting runs on a spreadsheet nobody trusts.
Students hand over: A working tool, a handoff doc, and a training session recording.
The partner keeps: A system a non-technical staff member can run alone.
Reflection prompt: What did you build because it was interesting rather than because it was needed?
Your prep: Force a scope freeze at week four and require a maintenance plan.
Capstone or seminarFull term
Requirements gatheringCritical thinkingSoftware developmentTechnical writing
Local government or civic group
Turn a partner's messy data into a decision dashboard
The need: The data exists across five files and answers nothing on deadline.
Students hand over: A cleaned dataset, a dashboard, and a one-page data dictionary.
The partner keeps: One recurring report that stops taking a staff day each month.
Reflection prompt: What decision would change if this number were wrong by ten percent?
Your prep: Set privacy rules for any resident-level data before students touch it.
Capstone or seminarFull term
Data cleaningCritical thinkingVisualizationDocumentation
Health or wellness organization
Map food or care access in one neighborhood
The need: The partner serves a service area they've never mapped by walkability or transit.
Students hand over: An access map, a gap list, and three site recommendations.
The partner keeps: A siting argument for their next grant or partnership.
Reflection prompt: Whose definition of 'access' did you use, and who did that definition leave out?
Your prep: Provide the mapping tool and one worked example before fieldwork.
Major course8 weeks
Geospatial analysisCritical thinkingCommunity researchPresentation
Community nonprofit
Run a real campaign for a partner's real deadline
The need: An event, a drive, or an enrollment window with no one to promote it.
Students hand over: A campaign brief, the assets, and a results memo with numbers.
The partner keeps: A measured lift against a baseline the partner named up front.
Reflection prompt: Which creative choice did the data contradict, and what did you do about it?
Your prep: Lock the baseline metric with the partner in week one or the results memo is fiction.
Major course8 weeks
Campaign strategyCopywritingCritical thinkingAnalytics
Local government or civic group
Collect and publish a community's oral history
The need: Institutional memory lives with a handful of people and isn't written down.
Students hand over: Ten recorded interviews, transcripts, consent forms, and a public exhibit or archive page.
The partner keeps: A permanent archive the library or city can keep adding to.
Reflection prompt: What did you edit out, and what did that choice do to whose story got told?
Your prep: Set consent and attribution standards, and secure a hosting home before recording.
Major courseFull term
InterviewingCritical thinkingArchival practiceCuration
K-12 school or district
Teach a financial literacy series to seniors at a partner high school
The need: Seniors are about to sign loan paperwork nobody has walked them through.
Students hand over: Four sessions delivered, a workbook, and pre/post quiz results.
The partner keeps: A measured knowledge gain and a workbook the counselor reuses.
Reflection prompt: What did you assume students already knew that they didn't?
Your prep: Vet content for accuracy and clear the schedule with the counselor.
Intro course4 weeks
TeachingCritical thinkingPlain-language writingPublic speaking
Small business or co-op
Run a clinic for small businesses that can't afford consultants
The need: Owners need pricing, bookkeeping, or online presence help and have no budget.
Students hand over: A written recommendation per business plus one implemented change.
The partner keeps: A concrete change in place, not a deck in a folder.
Reflection prompt: What advice did you give that the owner couldn't actually execute, and why?
Your prep: Screen participating businesses and set a scope boundary per team.
Capstone or seminarFull term
ConsultingCritical thinkingFinancial analysisClient communication
Local government or civic group
Write the policy brief a civic group needs for one hearing
The need: A decision is coming and the group has passion but no research memo.
Students hand over: A four-page brief with options, tradeoffs, and a testimony outline.
The partner keeps: A document entered into the public record on a real deadline.
Reflection prompt: Which option did you want to be right, and how did you test it anyway?
Your prep: Confirm the hearing date early so the term calendar matches the civic calendar.
Capstone or seminar8 weeks
Policy analysisCritical thinkingResearchPersuasive writing
Campus office or program
Design a first-year workshop with a campus office
The need: The office wants peer-delivered content and has no time to build it.
Students hand over: A 50-minute facilitator guide, slides, and pilot feedback data.
The partner keeps: A workshop the office can run every orientation.
Reflection prompt: What changed in the second run because of the first run's feedback?
Your prep: Book the pilot slot before students start designing.
Intro course4 weeks
FacilitationCritical thinkingInstructional designFeedback analysis
Community nonprofit
Review a partner's public materials for plain language and accessibility
The need: Forms and pages are written for staff, not for the people who use them.
Students hand over: An audit checklist, rewritten samples, and a style sheet.
The partner keeps: Public-facing text at a reading level their community can use.
Reflection prompt: What did clarity cost in nuance, and was that trade worth it?
Your prep: Pick the standard (WCAG, plain-language grade level) and hold everyone to it.
Intro course4 weeks
Plain-language writingCritical thinkingAccessibility reviewEditing
Health or wellness organization
Evaluate one partner program against its own stated goal
The need: The program has run for years without anyone checking whether it works.
Students hand over: A logic model, an evaluation plan, and a findings report with limitations.
The partner keeps: An honest read on the program and a measurement plan they can keep running.
Reflection prompt: What would you need to see to conclude this program should stop?
Your prep: Set expectations with the partner that findings may be unflattering.
Capstone or seminarFull term
Program evaluationCritical thinkingStatisticsReport writing
Campus office or program
Rebuild a partner's volunteer recruitment pipeline
The need: Recruitment is one email a semester and a table at an involvement fair.
Students hand over: A channel map, a message sequence, and a tracked signup funnel.
The partner keeps: A repeatable pipeline with numbers attached to each stage.
Reflection prompt: Where did people leave, and what did that tell you about the ask?
Your prep: Get access to the signup tool so students can measure, not guess.
Major course8 weeks
Marketing strategyCritical thinkingCopywritingFunnel analysis
Local government or civic group
Curate a public exhibit from partner work
The need: The partner's work is invisible to the community that funds it.
Students hand over: An installed exhibit, interpretive text, and attendance documentation.
The partner keeps: Public visibility they can show a council or a board.
Reflection prompt: Who was this exhibit for, and how did that change what you hung on the wall?
Your prep: Secure the venue and the install window before the design phase.
Major courseFull term
CurationCritical thinkingInterpretive writingProject management
Health or wellness organization
Produce a training video series a partner keeps using
The need: The same onboarding talk gets repeated live to every new volunteer.
Students hand over: Five short videos, captions, and a usage guide.
The partner keeps: Onboarding hours returned to staff every single cohort.
Reflection prompt: What got clearer when you had to say it in ninety seconds?
Your prep: Set a hard runtime limit and require captions for every deliverable.
Intro course8 weeks
Video productionCritical thinkingScriptwritingAccessibility captioning
Campus office or program
Write the handoff plan that keeps the partnership alive next term
The need: Every term the partner starts over with a new class and no memory.
Students hand over: A handoff packet: contacts, decisions, open questions, and next-term scope.
The partner keeps: A partnership that compounds instead of restarting.
Reflection prompt: What did you learn the hard way that the next team shouldn't have to?
Your prep: Reserve the last two weeks of term for it, or it never gets written.
Capstone or seminar4 weeks
Knowledge managementCritical thinkingDocumentationStakeholder management