Center for Community-Engaged Learning

At the Center for Community Engaged Learning (CCEL), our mission is to integrate faith-based, academic experiential learning into the educational pathways of graduate and undergraduate students. Through comprehensive student services – community advancement programs, academic service-learning, and study away – we strive to create a dynamic environment of collaboration. By partnering with faculty, staff, students, and community partners, we seek to establish reciprocal relationships that align with APU’s core values to cultivate Scholarship, deepen Service, build Community, and reflect the love and calling of Christ in the world.

Service Areas

• Academic Service-learning
• Community Advancement Programs (Community-Based Federal Work Study)
• Study Away

The Carnegie Foundation selected APU as 1 of 119 institutions to receive the 2020 Community Engagement Classification. These 119 institutions join the 240 institutions that earned the classification during the 2015 selection process, for a total of 359 campuses that are active holders of this important designation. This distinction recognizes universities that demonstrate a high level of commitment to community service and service-learning.

Academic Service-Learning commits to APU’s Academic Vision through rigorous and cumulative service-learning course assessment and evaluation. Quantitative and qualitative data collected from service-learning student evaluations at the conclusion of each semester provide evidence of transformational scholarship. The service-learning experience, linking theory and pedagogy with course-relevant community service, contributes to student learning outcomes and frequently leads to an increased understanding of God-honoring diversity, faith integration, and in some courses, international internationalization. Data reports are made available to individual course professors, departments, schools, and the Office of Institutional Research and Assessment.