James M. Frabutt, director of the Teaching Exceptional Children (TEC) program in the University of Notre Dame’s Alliance for Catholic Education program, has been asked by Provost Thomas G. Burish to take on the additional responsibility of serving as the director of academic community engagement.
In his new role, Frabutt will help facilitate and promote connecting the many intellectual assets of Notre Dame’s faculty to community, social, cultural, human and economic development. This additional set of duties was recommended by the University’s Community Engagement Coordinating Council, a body established in 2011 to deepen a culture of engagement between Notre Dame and community partners.
Frabutt will work in concert with the Center for Social Concerns, the institute that promotes community-based learning and research; the Office of Public Affairs, which coordinates various economic and educational engagement activities for the University; and other partners across campus.
Under Frabutt’s direction, the TEC program assists Catholic schoolteachers who work with children with disabilities and learning differences. He also is a faculty member in the Alliance for Catholic Education’s Mary Ann Remick Leadership Program, an initiative that prepares Catholic schoolteachers for administrative positions.
Frabutt earned a bachelor’s degree in psychology from Notre Dame and master’s and doctoral degrees in human development and family studies from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, where he previously served as deputy director of the Center for Youth, Family and Community Partnerships. He has published eight books and more than 45 articles and book chapters, and he has presented at some 70 regional and national research conferences.
Originally published by at news.nd.edu on September 16, 2013.