Joanne Troha

Director of Community Service Learning
Staff
College of Arts and Sciences: Fitz Center

Profile

Joanne Troha, Assistant Director, supervises Fitz Center activity in the Ballard Building. She brings a degree in education (UD) and over twenty years of neighborhood development experience to her current priorities, such as, coordinating service learning for the Center; a grant-funded partnership with Patterson-Kennedy School; the University’s role in Kids Voting and other community initiatives, often aimed at children and teens. She has built a career around developing new programs for UD and can draw on extensive experience in consulting and program design. Past assignments include work with UD’s original mini-course and interdisciplinary studies programs, a development project in West Africa, contract services for local and federal agencies, the community garden and affordable housing movement in Dayton, management and training programs for neighborhood leaders, grant writing, seven years of oversight of an AmeriCorps program, and most recently, support services to the University’s new Semester of Service.

The Staff Perspective

I am very conscious of the potential end result of offering our students high quality opportunities for service and learning beyond the classroom. There is so much our community partners can teach us about justice, personal responsibility and public policy! I really believe if we design these student assignments well, the real lessons may play out years from now -- when our alumni lead, vote and work for positive change in their own communities. That's my goal.