We know that now—more than ever—campuses need intentional spaces where individuals can come together to listen, share, and learn from one another across lines of difference.
Student unions and campus departments play a vital role in providing these spaces, helping to strengthen community bonds, address challenging topics, and foster the skills necessary for constructive dialogue. Your work in this area not only impacts your campus but also serves as a model for others seeking to engage their communities in similar ways. Through this resource page, we seek to share and highlight various tools and programs committed to active dialogue and civic engagement.
Active Dialogue & Civic Engagement Showcase Submissions Call
ACUI is seeking to highlight innovative and impactful active dialogue/civic engagement programs taking place on member campuses. These programs will be featured on this webpage. In addition, there will be opportunities to showcase these programs in the ACUI Bulletin and at ACUI events. We invite you to submit programs that:
- Foster open, respectful conversations across differences
- Promote inclusion, understanding, and empathy among participants
- Could serve as a model for replication or adaptation by other institutions
Active Dialogue & Civic Engagement Resources
The Active Dialogue Self-Assessment Inventory is designed to support college union and student activities professionals in self-directed reflection and professional growth. This tool helps assess the knowledge, abilities, and behaviors needed to facilitate meaningful and effective dialogue in higher education settings. It may be used by professionals leading formal dialogue initiatives, supervising staff, facilitating student engagement, or navigating everyday conversations in their roles.
Constructive Dialogue Institute
The Constructive Dialogue Institute works with institutions across the education, for-profit, non-profit, and public sectors to help them communicate across differences and build inclusive cultures. The CDI Resource Library provides exercises, webinars, instructor guides, and perspectives that students and professionals can utilize when thinking about creating an environment open to election preparation.
Chronicle of Higher Education
According to a recent survey from The Chronicle, respondents agreed that teaching students how to engage respectfully with differing opinions should be part of their institution’s mission, with more than 60 percent of administrators and faculty members agreeing strongly.
In this latest research brief, “Fostering Civil Dialogue,” get an exclusive look at the results of the survey and learn how colleges across the country are responding to the increasing popularity of civil-discourse initiatives.
Speaking with several experts of civil dialogue, this report also looks into the best ways to put all this into practice — whether that’s in the classroom or through other forums or spaces across campus.
- Navigating the New Wave of Student Activism: Strategies to Engage and Respond to Student Activists
- Campus Free Expression: A New Roadmap: Academic Leaders Task Force on Campus Free Expression
- Free Speech On Campus: Policy Audit and Supplemental Resources
- Freedom of Expression in Higher Education (Outline)
- How campuses can protect free speech and student safety amid the Israel-Hamas war
- Preserving Campus Discourse: Leadership Exchange – Preserving Campus Discourse: A Multipronged Approach to Protecting Free Speech
- Tensions over Israel-Hamas war simmer on college campuses
Courageous Dialogues from Center for Campus Involvement, University Unions
Students learn more about engaging in open, authentic, and respectful conversations in their organizations, discussing how to express values and, in turn, open up the possibilities of shifting perspectives and better interconnectedness within their circles. Learn more here (scroll down to “Learn More About Courageous Dialogues”).
Dialogue Michigan from The Program on Intergroup Relations, Student Life
Dialogue Michigan builds capacity across the University of Michigan to engage one another in difficult conversations. There is a campus network of and resources for units, including the Center for Campus Involvement in University Unions, who are delivering dialogue workshops.
Life-Changing Education Grants for the University of Michigan from the Provost’s Office
Every grant must connect to at least one of these core themes that define Life-Changing Education. One of the themes is Open Inquiry (learning to disagree well so ideas grow stronger). University of Michigan units are invited to apply for funding to deliver on related sets of work.
Talking Maize & Blue from the Provost’s Office
The Talking Maize & Blue task force was commissioned by University of Michigan Provost Laurie McCauley in February 2025. Our charge was to foster a culture of open inquiry on campus by creating a required online module for incoming students and a suite of optional follow-on experiences. See the Happening @ Michigan event calendar for events tagged with “Open Inquiry.” Open Inquiry & Productive Disagreement is one of the four featured ways in the University of Michigan’s Life Changing Education theme year for 2025–26.
Community Dialogue Series
Community Dialogues are opportunities for students, faculty, and staff to come together to develop a comprehensive and better-informed understanding of our community’s most pressing and often controversial issues in a space that is safe for all perspectives to share, listen, and learn. In small groups with trained facilitators, participants discuss different ways we can look at and address these issues as a group.
Each community dialogue session is 90 minutes long and begins with an overview of participant expectations as well as the role of the facilitator. An introduction to the background guide and dialogue topic is given, followed by an activity for the participants to introduce themselves and build a community in their small-group cohorts. The discussion questions are split into two sections which are each 20 minutes long. The session concludes by bringing back all the participants for a share back opportunity.
Dialogue topics are thoughtfully selected at the start of each semester and by the students and staff at the Center for Civic Justice based on the national and local climate, to ensure we are creating space for students to engage in timely and pressing issues that are impacting them and the world around them. The background guides for each topic are created—for students, by students— with informative graphics, key terms, historical context and resources to continue the conversation beyond the dialogue. Students from the Center for Civic Justice conduct research to design and create these guides over the course of 4 to 6 weeks leading up to each conversation.
Community members are asked to think critically about issues affecting their communities and the different perspectives and perceptions that exist within a single community about any given issue.
