Community Engagement and Public Service Activities

Created in 1968 as a way to increase college attendance among first-generation, underrepresented students at Indiana University, the Groups Scholars Program provides academic, financial, and social support to help students attain a bachelor's degree at Indiana University. The program offers an extensive student support system, including academic advising, tutoring, enrollment in specialized courses, and activities designed to foster academic success and degree completion.

If students have completed all of the preliminary requirements to participate in the Groups Scholars Program, they will be eligible to attend the Summer Experience Program (SEP). The experience includes taking part in a rigorous college “boot camp” designed to provide a taste of college work in areas such as Business, Informatics, Public Health, Sociology, and many more to help facilitate the transition from high school to college.

This is a self-paced professional development course at IU Expand using Canvas and in Google Classroom designed for educators with no experience teaching or taking online courses. The courses let educators first experience interactive online assignments, virtual formative assessments, and virtual summative assessments.  Those experiences prepare participants to use hands-on templates and step-by-step instructions to create assignments and assessments for their own students. 

IU is working with four partner school districts—School City of East Chicago, Elkhart Community Schools, Madison Consolidated Schools, and Monroe County Community School Corporation—to develop a pipeline analysis that tracks students through K–12, into postsecondary education, and into the Indiana workforce. After using the pipeline analysis to identify “leakages,” project participants will conduct additional research to better understand the situation and identify strategies to increase student persistence and attainment. IU will work with the districts to design, implement, and assess interventions. The lessons gained from assessment will aid continuous improvement.