The Wilks Institute for Leadership and Service is Miami University's center for leadership education, civic engagement, and service learning. Through collaboration with community partners, student leaders, faculty, and staff, The Wilks Institute develops engaged leaders focused on ethical leadership and advancing community priorities.

The Wilks Institute for Leadership and Service grounds their work in the following Practiced Principles:

LEADERSHIP & SERVICE

The Wilks Institute develops student centered programming that prioritizes the needs of the community. We practice leadership and service as reciprocal processes and encourage students to make connections within their communities and with each other.

COMMUNITY ENGAGED LEARNING

The Wilks Institute, in collaboration with staff and faculty, creates mutually beneficial and sustainable partnerships with our community partners as co-educators. We prepare students for lives as impactful leaders and active community members by encouraging students to take ownership of their own ideas and experiences.

CRITICAL REFLECTION

The Wilks Institute challenges perceptions and assumptions of leadership and service by creating opportunities for critical reflection and education that prompt interpersonal and interpersonal growth. We address the interconnected challenges of leadership, community, and civic engagement through values, self-awareness, and dialogue.

CIVIC RESPONSIBILITY

The Wilks Institute believes that civic engagement includes responding to a sense of responsibility to one’s community through both political and non-political means. We create a culture of civic responsibility that is asset-based, rooted in personal and community values, and contributes to the common good.