The Center for Community Engagement serves as The University of Texas at Austin’s central resource for those interested in volunteerism and service-learning throughout the UT and Austin communities.
Our continued goal is to connect the resources of the university to the community to meet community priorities.
We provide resources for anyone interested in getting more involved in the community, and our programs and services are designed for instructors, students, student organizations, campus departments, community partners, and local agencies.
Staff
Suchitra Gururaj, Ph.D.
Assistant Vice President, Community and Economic Engagement
suchi.gururaj@austin.utexas.edu
512-232-2164
Suchitra Gururaj, Ph.D., serves as Assistant Vice President for Community and Economic Engagement in the Division of Campus and Community Engagement at The University of Texas at Austin, where she is the visionary and strategic lead for student engagement programs rooted in service, community-based learning course offerings, public engagement programming, and in-kind sponsorships. A lecturer in the College of Liberal Arts at UT-Austin, Dr. Gururaj teaches courses on community organizing and leadership development. Her research focuses on service-learning outcomes, university-community partnerships, and social inclusion policies in higher education. Dr. Gururaj earned a B.A. in English literature from Yale University, an M.A. in English from The University of Chicago, and a Ph.D. in educational administration from The University of Texas at Austin. Dr. Gururaj serves as book review editor for the Michigan Journal of Community Service Learning, sits on the editorial board of the Journal of Higher Education Outreach and Engagement, and holds a seat on the Executive Committee for the Commission on Economic and Community Engagement for the Association of Public and Land-Grant Universities.
Emma Middleton
Senior Administrative Associate
emma.middleton@austin.utexas.edu
512-232-8586
Emma has served as the senior administrative associate for the Center Community Engagement since 2015. She has been with the division for over eleven years. She provides administrative and logistical support, assists with day-to-day operations, as well as managerial support to the team. She is currently working on her B.A. in Christian Studies from the Austin Graduate School of Theology. In her spare time she enjoys family activities, people watching and good movies.
Amory Krueger
Director, Direct Service and Leadership Programs
amory.krueger@austin.utexas.edu
512-471-6161
Amory Krueger currently serves as the director for student engagement programs in the Center for Community Engagement, overseeing service resources and programs that connect anyone at UT looking to volunteer with community organizations who need volunteers. She has been a staff member in LCCE since fall of 2007, when she started as a graduate assistant while completing her master’s degree in Higher Education Administration (M.Ed ’09). Amory graduated from Arizona State University in 2007, and is also a proud Hoosier, having grown up in Indiana.
Rachel Butler
Director, Explore UT
rachel.butler@austin.utexas.edu
Rachel Butler currently serves as a director for the Explore UT program. In this role, Rachel researches and re-visions the scope, goals, and opportunities of Explore UT, once defined as UT-Austin’s open house. Located in the community engagement portfolio that also includes the CCE and TGRC, Rachel seeks to determine the ways that all 19 colleges, schools, and units might forge reciprocal and sustainable campus-community collaborations and once again open the campus to our communities. A graduate of UT’s Butler School of Music, Rachel returns to UT after 8 years in public K-12 education in Austin ISD, Georgetown ISD, and Round Rock ISD; during that tenure, she was named 2019 Teacher of the Year. Rachel’s enthusiasm about the possibilities around Explore UT is also rooted in her experience bringing her own students to the UT campus. Rachel holds a B.A. in music and a B.A. in history from Boston College and a M.A. in music and human learning from the Butler School.
Stephanie L. Lang
Director, Community-Driven Initiatives
Stephanielang@austin.utexas.edu
512-471-7683
Rittika Pandey
Graduate Assistant
rittikap@utexas.edu
Texas Grants Resource Center
Assistant Director for Programs, Texas Grants Resource Center
amy.loar@austin.utexas.edu Amy Loar comes to the TGRC with 20 years’ experience in the nonprofit community, where she served in programmatic, development, and executive leadership roles. Amy completed her undergraduate work at The University of Texas at Austin and has a Master of Public Affairs from the LBJ School of Public Affairs at UT-Austin. As Assistant Director for Programs, Amy will help to connect the grant-making and grant-seeking communities in Austin and Central Texas as well as work with the CCE’s directors to vision the future of programming for the TGRC. This role will allow Amy to work in the community with partners as well as with community-engaged faculty and students. When Amy is not working, she is busy with her husband, 2 daughters, 3 cats and 1 dog. She also loves to read, cook, needlepoint, travel, and spend time with friends and extended family.
Land Acknowledgement
We would like to acknowledge that we are meeting on the Indigenous lands of Turtle Island, the ancestral name for what now is called North America.
Moreover, (I) We would like to acknowledge the Alabama-Coushatta, Caddo, Carrizo/Comecrudo, Coahuiltecan, Comanche, Kickapoo, Lipan Apache, Tonkawa and Ysleta Del Sur Pueblo, and all the American Indian and Indigenous Peoples and communities who have been or have become a part of these lands and territories in Texas.