Community Partners Directory

Additional Resources

Community-Engaged Learning Coordinators

Social Concerns Fair

Community Engagement Awards

COVID-19 UPDATE: The current Coronavirus outbreak has ongoing, direct consequences for both the operations and needs of many community organizations. In accordance with public health guidelines, some organizations are still not able to accept on-site volunteers and some are unable to accommodate remote collaboration. Please reach out to an organization directly to learn more. Learn more

Connect with Local Community Partners

The Center for Social Concerns invites you to expand your learning and work into the neighborhoods of South Bend and beyond. Thousands of Notre Dame faculty, staff, and students take part in opportunities offered through the center and our many partners. Consider engaging with an organization in the directory below through a Community-Engaged Course, research project, or volunteer opportunity.

Community partners listed in this directory work with the center's Community-Engaged Learning Program Director to better understand the center's core principles for academic community engagement:  university/community courses, research projects, and volunteer opportunities are designed and delivered collaboratively to meet the needs of community partners as well as the learning goals of university members,  outcomes and deliverables from the collaboration are designed with community partners to advance their work and belong to them upon completion, and. the aim of such collaborations is social justice.

Seven of these partner sites host Community-Engaged Learning Coordinators (CELC) who are part of a practitioners group on community-engaged research, teaching, and learning. CELCs have significant experience partnering with individuals at Notre Dame and can help students and instructors find agencies to collaborate with in mutually beneficial ways.

Students, Faculty, and Staff: Get Started!

To start your community engagement, contact a CELC or any of the organizations listed here to ask what they need and develop ways to collaborate together. Contact the Community-Engaged Learning Program Director (Dave Lassen, dlassen@nd.edu) if you have any questions.

Community Organizations: Apply to Partner with the Center for Social Concerns

If you are a community partner who would like to be considered a partner of the Center for Social Concerns and added to this directory, contact the Community-Engaged Learning Program Director (Dave Lassen, dlassen@nd.edu). Partners of the center must:

  • Do work that aligns with the mission and values of the University and the Center for Social Concerns; 
  • Provide ongoing evidence of compliance with risk mitigation and safety efforts for volunteers;
  • Provide excellent orientation, placement, supervision, reflection, and assessment of volunteers;
  • Communicate accurately and responsively with University partners and volunteers;
  • Participate as they are able in events and activities that advance academic community engagement, such as the Social Concerns Fair.

We look forward to seeing the positive community impact that happens when we collaborate!

 
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Disaster Relief

American Red Cross, St. Joseph County Chapter

Focus: 
To provide compassionate care to those in need, and to prevent and relieve suffering locally and globally through five key service areas of disaster relief, health and safety services, international services, support to military families, and biomedical services.
Education

Camp Mariposa

Focus: 
Camp Mariposa® is a free addiction prevention and mentoring program that combines traditional camp fun with education and support exercises led by mental health professionals and trained mentors. Camp Mariposa is part of Eluna’s national Camp Mariposa program.
Education

City of South Bend

Focus: 
To deliver services which empower everyone to thrive.
Education

Clay High School

Focus: 
Clay High School is South Bend’s magnet high school for the arts. Located in an urban setting, the focus is to prepare the students for a successful transition to adult life.
Education

enFocus

Focus: 
EnFocus works with their fellows to help local sponsors and create projects of their own, with the goal of retaining talented individuals in the community to better the community.
Domestic Violence

Family Justice Center

Focus: 
To provide crisis intervention, support, and advocacy to victims of domestic violence and sexual assault.
Education

Good Shepherd Montessori School

Focus: 
To serve children ages 3–14 using the Montessori method, the Catechesis of the Good Shepherd, and nature education; we form students to be good stewards of the Earth through weekly lessons and work on local farms as well as permaculture practices on our urban school-farm, and we become good community members by practicing peace and offering service to the poor and elderly.
Education

Holy Cross School

Focus: 
Holy Cross School is a place where faith could be taught, nurtured, and practiced freely.
Education

La Casa De Amistad, Inc. — CELC SITE

Focus: 
To empower the Latino/Hispanic community within Michiana by providing educational, cultural, and advocacy services in a welcoming, bilingual environment.
Education

Notre Dame Upward Bound

Focus: 
To serve and be an advocate for first-generation and low-income high school students from the South Bend community and to help them successfully graduate from high school, enroll in and graduate from a post -secondary institution.
Education

Pet Refuge

Focus: 
To find placements of unwanted and abandoned pets into responsible permanent homes. Pet Refuge sees to the needs of ALL the animals in our facility as they await their forever homes.
Education

Potawatomi Zoo

Focus: 
To protect and help save animals that can no longer live on their own in the wild, and to participate in conservation efforts to save threatened species
Education

Robinson Community Learning Center — CELC SITE

Focus: 
To facilitate community and Notre Dame partnerships and to strengthen the Northeast Neighborhood of South Bend through relationship building and educational opportunities.
Education

South Bend Community School Corporation (SBCSC) - Adult Education Department

Focus: 
To strengthen the community by inspiring life-long learning and career advancement.
Education

South Bend Community School Corporation (SBCSC) - Bilingual Services Department

Focus: 
To provide instructional and support services to Grades pre-K - 12 English Language Learners, immigrant, migrant, and refugee students.
Education

South Bend Education Foundation

Focus: 
To advocate, promote and fund initiatives to enrich learning experiences for students and staff of the SBCSC
Education

St. Adalbert School

Focus: 
To strive to educate children in the faith and in general academics.
Domestic Violence

YWCA North Central Indiana

Focus: 
To assist women and children who are victims of domestic violence achieve self-sufficiency, and to advocate for change within the community to eliminate racism and sexism.
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Upcoming Events

March 2023

April 2023

03
Canceled: Social Concerns Fair | Immigration and Human Rights
Monday, April 3, 2023 - 4:30pm to 6:30pm
13
Submission Deadline: Arts of Dignity Student Art Exhibit
Thursday, April 13, 2023 - 12:00am to 11:45pm
13
Researching for Justice
Thursday, April 13, 2023 - 4:00pm
19
Alumni Book Club | Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver
Wednesday, April 19, 2023 - 7:00pm to 8:15pm
19
A Conversation with Sister Norma Pimentel, MJ
Wednesday, April 19, 2023 - 7:30pm
20
Arts of Dignity | Student Art Exhibition
Thursday, April 20, 2023 - 5:00pm
24
Submission Deadline: 2023 Student Awards
Monday, April 24, 2023 - 5:00pm
28
Labor Café
Friday, April 28, 2023 - 5:00pm

May 2023

19
Senior Send-Off Ceremony and Reception
Friday, May 19, 2023 - 7:00pm