The benefits of community-based research (CBR) in the sociology classroom go beyond those associated with traditional service learning. Here, students use their sociological skills to examine and propose solutions to local social problems addressed by community organizations. Through analyzing students' course reflection journals and the results…

Reviews a community training program for undergraduate students at a small liberal arts college in Alton, Illinois. The program involves students in a community work placement, a community studies course, and work study experience in a small industrial town near the college. (Author/DB)

Uses a class exercise that tests the folk wisdom concerning small-town friendliness. Students are assigned to express random friendliness to strangers so they can determine whether friendlier responses are elicited in small towns or large cities. (KO)

Offers suggestions for a sociology course in extraordinary groups, utopian studies, or alternative communities to help broaden awareness and understanding of human behavior, past and present groups, and cultural pluralism. Includes ideas for field trips, projects, readings, and films and videos. Discusses basing lectures on commitment, conversion,…

Describes METROPROB, a noncompetitive teaching game based on the theory of metropolitan locality-relevant problems and stressing their interactions. Discusses potential for teaching systemic analysis of urban problems and helping students think sociologically. (Author/CK)