The Art of Association has been through a number of different phases at the IHC.

Phase I offered the IHC Board the opportunity to reflect on their role as civic leaders, and more specifically on their role as members of the IHC. As Phase I discussions took place at IHC Board meetings, they also included staff. Phase II offered the same opportunity to younger people doing work as civic leaders in their communities. These discussions took place at two Americorps sites in Chicago (Public Allies and Project YES) and focused on issues of social justice.

The most recent phase of the program, The Meaning of Service (MoS), grew out of Phase II. Funded by the Project on Civic Reflection at Valparaiso University, Building Toward Justice is a discussion series in which Americorps volunteers and staff members are given the opportunity to reflect on the meaning and content of their commitment to public service. What does it mean to choose to serve? What or whom are we serving, and why? What is social justice, and what is the character of its call?

Each session of the MoS series is oriented around one or two brief but provocative readings. Whether participants look at Jean-Jacques Rousseau's consideration of our obligation to others, Henry MacNeal Turner's speech on rights, or J.M. Coetzee's investigation of the way we treat animals, the goal of the MoS series is clear: to think, speak, and listen carefully, with the hope that participants can enhance their understanding of why they do what they do, and perhaps thereby improve what they do.

The IHC recently received a three-year grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities to disseminate MoS to other parts of Illinois and other states. In October, the IHC ran a conference for six states and some downstate Illinois participants, and the same will happen in October 2006.