Rationale and Design for the Multicultural Learning Community

Abstract

In the quote above, Sasha reflected on her experience in the Multicultural Learning Community (MLC) at the end of her first semester in college. She highlighted the ways in which learning together facilitated her transition to college and invited her peers to be teachers and co-learners in her educational journey. She also alluded to challenges in the journey, noting that it is not merely “book smarts,” but the capacity to persist that is critical to completing college. To provide context to the experience and voice of the student participants, this chapter provides an overview of the learning-community design, the rationale that shaped the curriculum and pedagogy, and how and where it was programmatically situated on campus.

Many of my doubts and fears are gone. I have learned just as much from the students as I have from the teachers. I realized that we are all in this together and that we have to help each other in order to succeed. College is not about the one who is the smartest but more so about the one who is willing to stay until the end. College is not about being alone. There are some people who realize that college is something we have to do together, and those are the people I want to surround myself with. This is all due to the learning community that I realize this. I think that all first year students should have to enter in a learning community. I feel this was the best way to leave high school and enter college. I could not have made it [without] the learning community, who are now more like family. To everyone I say thank you.

—Sasha, African American female student