Community literacy projects as vehicles of change : an analysis and application of indigenous community empowerment strategies to create self-motivated and effective composition service learning projects

Graduation date: 2011Literacy projects can lead to community empowerment, particularly when roundtable discussions initiate goals and students draw on their experiences and strengths to serve as "literacy ambassadors." In the two following linked manuscripts, I make my case for a literacy ambassador model of literacy service learning project that engages communities and educators in synergistic enterprises that combine the goals of pedagogy and social justice. I incorporate key principle indigenous literacy narratives, a service learning literature review and the Oregon Writing Liaison project propose a structure for community writing projects that is non-hierarchical, motivated by collective community consciousness of shared needs and goals, and based around the work of student literacy ambassadors who serve as liaisons to their communities in order to make real changes in their own lives and the lives of those they love