With the distance of four years, I only remember a little bit about getting ready to leave for college. Mostly, I just remember the feeling of anticipation, wanting so desperately to get out of my parents’ house, out of my hometown, and dive into Wesleyan. And I imagine many of you are feeling the same way right about now. So even though you still have about ten days until you arrive on-campus (unless you are international student), I want to take the time to say…

WELCOME!

Welcome not only to Wesleyan, the institution where you will be spending most of the next four years, but also the the ENGAGE blog. What is the ENGAGE blog you ask? Well, consider this a crash-course in Wesleyan and acronyms.

You may not know this yet, but here at Wesleyan, we pretty much have two conventions of naming organizations, institutions, events, etc. Either we just stick ‘Wes’ in front or occasionally within a word (see Weshop, Weswings, and, my least favorite, Espwesso) or we just use an acronym for shorthand. Why is this of importance? Well, because to understand the purpose of this blog, you have to understand the crazy alphabet soup that ENGAGE represents.

Take a look at our logo. Each of those tiny blocks of color serve a dual purpose. For one, they are aesthetically pleasing. But secondly, they represent an office on campus that ENGAGE seeks to represent and publicize for. These offices (listed in order that their color appears on our logo) are: the Service Learning Center (SLC), the Office of Community Service (OCS), the Office of Community Relations (OCR), WesU FM, the Center for Prison Education (CPE), the Patricelli Center for Social Entrepreneurship (PCSE), and the Green Street Arts Center (GSAC). Together, all of these offices (with the exception of the Patricelli Center) make up the Center for Community Partnerships. These offices are chiefly located in in Allbritton Center for the Study of Public Life (often just referred to as Allbritton). So in short, (SLC+OCS+OCR+WesU+CPE=CCP)+PCSE=ENGAGE.

Got that?

Don’t worry if you don’t. For one, we posted a graphic that will hopefully make everything a little more clear. Secondly, all you really need to know is that these offices share a common theme, civic engagement. In fact, that is why our blog is called ENGAGE. We aim to cover all things civic engagement, both at Wesleyan and in a larger global context.

Not sure what civic engagement is or how to get involved? Not to worry! This next week, I will be posting every day about different ways to get involved through all of these offices. I will post about civic engagement in the classroom, in your extracurriculars, and even after Wesleyan, so check back soon!

In the meantime, check out out these other platforms ENGAGE content pulls from:
Office of Community Service Facebook
Patricelli Center for Social Entrepreneurship Facebook
WesU FM Facebook
Green Street Arts Center Facebook
Center for Prison Education Facebook, Twitter, and Newsletter
Engage Twitter