Course Successes

PSYC 5243: Prevention and Intervention in Communities

In order to give the students hands-on experience with program development and grant writing, they are asked to partner with an NGO to design a prevention program and write up a grant to fund it. Students will then present their program designs to a panel of judges. Last year, five NGO’s participated in the competition and three judges from Egyptian foundations paneled the event. Stories on the winning project, Trash Into Cash, appeared in two newspapers, Daily News Egypt and Al Wafd, and the television program CBC Extra. Carie Forden, professor of psychology, also was invited to present a poster about the project at CLT’s Center for Learning and Teaching Day.

The students, as well as the collaborating community organizations and judges felt that it was a very positive experience, which opened up a number of additional opportunities for collaboration, including internship placements, class presentations, research projects and community-based learning experiences in other classes.

"I believe this project provides students with a great opportunity to learn about prevention and grant writing in a real-world context," Forden affirmed. "I also believe it benefits the partnering NGOs as they are able to keep the project design and grant proposals for their own use, and if there is funding provided, are able to implement the program."