Andrew Furco engages with Pope Francis during Vatican session on service-learning for youth

Department of Organizational Leadership, Policy, and Development Associate Professor and Associate Department Chair Andrew Furco recently participated in a session with Pope Francis, which focused on examining the role of service-learning in promoting young people's capacities to work together to build positive human relationships and a more peaceful world. 

During the meeting, Pope Francis highlighted the valuable role that academically integrated service-learning plays in Catholic education in fostering a sense of communal responsibility among students and how service-learning promotes an education that engages students minds (head), sense of care (heart), and action (hands). Pope Francis invited session participants to advance service-learning "to produce fruits of peace, justice, and mutual acceptance among all peoples and expand its positive effects in ever closer forms of cooperation." 

The invitational session was held as part of a global symposium focused on the institutionalization of service-learning, co-hosted by LUMSA University in Rome and the Uniservitate program, a multi-faceted initiative funded by Porticus and led by the Centro Latino Americano Servicio y Solidario (CLAYSS). Now in its fourth year, Uniservitate is a 10-year project centered on furthering the advancement and institutionalization of service-learning at more than 30 Catholic higher education institutions across the globe. Furco participated as a member of Uniservitate's international Academic Board and as one of the lead investigators of a research project focused on identifying factors that promote the institutionalization of service-learning in Catholic higher education.