Center for Democracy and Civic Life Staff Present at CLDE

• “Building Community for Civic Engagement: Networking for CLDE”: This was the conference’s first session, designed to welcome everyone and provide information especially helpful for less experienced participants. McRae developed and led the session with Charis Lawson ‘20, English, a former Center for Democracy and Civic Life program specialist who is now Coordinator for Civic Engagement in Towson University’s Office of Civic Engagement and Social Responsibility. This was McRae’s sixth CLDE meeting, and her second time co-designing and co-hosting this introductory session.

• “Pedagogy for Thriving Democracy: ‘Stories are Everything’ and other Civic Maxims”: McRae and Dr. Hoffman led this session in which they introduced the Center for Democracy and Civic Life’s Civic Life Maxims and demonstrated how they use them as teaching tools in the Center’s programs and courses.

• “Institutionally Articulating the Higher Purpose: Framing Civic Learning and Community Engagement.” Dr. Hoffman served as the discussant for this panel presentation about how to describe higher education’s civic purposes, responding to ideas shared by faculty and staff leaders from Middle Tennessee State University, the University of North Carolina at Pembroke, and Central Arkansas University.

McRae served on the 2024 CLDE Meeting planning committee (her second stint as a planning committee member). She is UMBC’s campus liaison to the American Democracy Project, and Dr. Hoffman is a member of the American Democracy Project Steering Committee.