​To ReEngage or DisEngage?

In less than a month, students complete the academic year and depart for the sun, sand and balmy breezes of internship season. For over 400 students, however, the closing of the academic calendar brings DukeEngage Academy, the orientation program for those participating in DukeEngage this summer. The perennial academy attempts to inoculate students against the pitfalls of disingenuous volunteering. However, the persistence of problems with the programs merits our reevaluation of the effectiveness of DukeEngage.

Since its inception in 2007, DukeEngage has commanded impressive numbers of students. Today, almost a quarter of each graduating class at Duke participates in the program at some point during their undergraduate years. The program’s focus on “providing meaningful assistance to communities in the US and abroad” through immersive service is a double-edged sword. While the program has been lauded for increasing student global awareness, it has also garnered criticism for the short-lived nature of the community service it promotes. Once accepted to DukeEngage, some students experience disorganized community partnerships, gaining an inaccurate representation of volunteering abroad.

Those critical of the program argue against its model of “voluntourism,” claiming that service motivated by the allure of exotic travel is antithetical to the true spirit of volunteering. Although the program makes students privy to the limited scope of their involvement, it often provides no resources for motivated students to further engage with their host communities. While it is unreasonable to expect students to fully embrace and integrate into new communities in eight short weeks, a lack of substantial institutional support makes the tasks seemingly impossible. Insufficient student investment in the projects may simply be a byproduct of inadequacies in the structure of particular programs.

Successful programs like Kenya-WISER have developed long-term, robust models. By combining on-campus and on-site programming, WISER encourages students to engage beyond the eight weeks spent in Kenya. The program maintains a club to support its summer efforts and requires future program attendees to take a house course in order to better prepare themselves for their summers of service. The key component to WISER’s success, however, is its strong on-site and on-campus faculty mentorship. Because the program’s founder provides necessary expertise and guidance directly to students, the program attendees are more invested in the outcomes of their summers. Modelling programs after the success of WISER would allay some criticisms often levied on DukeEngage.

To further develop other DukeEngage programs, we suggest more stringent pre-acceptance screening. In the past, we have urged DukeEngage to become more selective. The efficacy of DukeEngage depends on allowing students to reflect on privileges afforded to them in a deliberate, genuine manner. The efficacy of that particular DukeEngage goal is severely diminished when all participants are not properly motivated. A more extensive interview process is recommended to review candidates best suited for DukeEngage. Once chosen, attendees should be required to integrate their summer work into their time on campus through either pre-departure trainings and language classes or post-program reflections on blogs. Also, the development of a mandatory DukeEngage house course for each program for alumni and future participants would promote program consistency from year to year and allow service to transcend the eight-week summer windows.

A two-day academy is not sufficient to remind students to be humble in their approaches to their summer experiences. Only structural changes to the program can push students toward authentic commitments to service, even beyond DukeEngage.