From the Director

The Egan Office of Urban Education and Community Partnerships continues to provide a platform for community voices and a catalyst for change in Chicago’s most disadvantaged communities.

The Egan Office has a rich history of integrating academic excellence with authentic community engagement. Our students are situated front and center on critical issues confronting our schools and grapple with the ideal of social justice in those spaces. From our veteran’s project to the school-base initiatives we strive to negotiate an intentional, systematic and transformative university-community approach that would achieve community-identified outcomes.

The Egan Office formula for university-community engagement follows in the path of Monsignor John J. Egan and John McKnight’s approach to community engagement. The activist role that em-bodied Father Egan confronted unjust systems while at the same time “connected the dots” to create impact particularly in communities of color. McKnight’s asset-based approach recognizes that real community building starts from identifying the strengths and gifts that already exist in the community. 

John W. Zeigler,
Director​