Art in a Democratic Society

This presentation will describe the development of an arts-based, civics-focused service-learning course in the context of the COVID pandemic and the hyper-polarized 2020 United States Presidential Election. The pandemic upended routine operations at colleges and universities around the globe as institutions were forced to pivot to remote and hybrid forms of teaching. This created challenges with service-learning courses, as they rely upon reciprocal and traditionally in-person community partnerships to successfully function and thrive. During the 2019-2020 academic year, I developed a service-learning course titled Art in a Democratic Society. The course was developed with three main components, an art studio component, a political theory seminar component, and a service-learning focus. As the COVID pandemic upended normal college operations, I worked to rethink how one offers an intended in-person service-learning course with COVID precautions. The course was rethought in a hybrid format, working closely in coordination with our campus and community partners. The students participated in our campus get-out-the-vote efforts during the 2020 U.S. Presidential Election and engaged in election-related service projects in the community by becoming poll workers. This presentation will describe the development of this course in the pre-pandemic period, the pivot to hybrid learning, the importance of institutional support in the success of the course, the importance of creative and experiential courses focused on civics to the flourishing of a just multicultural democracy, as well as how the subsequent iterations of this course have continued to develop from the experience of the initial pilot course.