Learners' Voices

In this chapter, the authors examine examples of local, national, and global adaptations of UC Links programs to explore university and community engagement over time and across a range of contexts. The authors describe the development of a number of programs, including two Brazilian programs, two programs working with gitano (Roma) communities in Spain, and perhaps the most enduring Fifth Dimension program – the Whittier College Fifth Dimension. They examine the collaborative development of these programs in relation to the ways that they co-constructed activities to support the navigational play of children and university students in creating and participating in collaborative learning activities. The authors also describe the “border activities” – the sustained collaborative work of adults from different backgrounds and communities – crucial to developing these programs as themselves forms of navigational play that serve to integrate participants' metacognitive understandings of their collaborative work.