Arts & Sciences
Sharpe Community Scholars Program

Sharpe Community Scholars

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Our Program

In collaboration with W&M faculty, the Sharpe Program advances community-based research and teaching in courses with integrated, community partnering. The Sharpe Community Scholars Program is a living-learning community of first-year students interested in community engagement, social justice, and collaborative research.

Our Mission: Sharpe strives to support the development of select students through the integration of academic studies, research and community engagement.

Sharpe supports faculty with funding to fulfill community-based teaching and research goals in the program, and offers students summer grants to expand their capacity for community-based research in critical inquiry and social action outside of classes.

{{youtube:medium:center|sNVpveg-n4M, Learn more about the program from director Dr. Monica Griffin and program coordinator Maxwell Cloe}}

First-year Sharpe Community Scholars share their very own Living-Learning Community in Spotswood Hall. Yearlong special interest programming gives Sharpe scholars the opportunity to work closely with faculty, community partners, campus professionals, and peer mentors in forming plans toward community-based research.

Sharpe Scholars presenting their story quilt squares after participating in the Communal Quilt Project

Information about the Sharpe program
Sharpe Action Research Internship Summer Funding Sharpe Scholars are eligible to apply for action research summer funding. This grant provides students with a $4000 stipend to engage community-based research in an internship with a community partner. Information about the summer research grant application process can be found on the Charles Center website.
Our Living-Learning Community Values We are committed to student development and academic rigor through our first-year experience —the Sharpe Living-Learning Community in Spotswood Hall. We build students’ capacity to conduct ethical and responsive, participatory action research –through course work and training in mixed methodologies for working with and within communities. We believe that knowledge is embodied in the everyday experiences of all human beings in many forms of community, and that the residents of our local neighborhoods and surrounding communities continually produce knowledge that is central to our research activity. We uphold local knowledge as essential in the formation of the participatory action research process and the direction that it takes. We value self-reflection that cultivates awareness of ourselves as scholars who are members of the local community and not set apart from it.

Apply Here!

Our Program

Sharpe Action Research Internship Summer Funding

Our Living-Learning Community Values