Ira Harkavy is Founder and Barbara and Edward Netter Director of the Netter Center for Community Partnerships. Harkavy teaches in the departments of history, urban studies, and Africana studies, and in the Graduate School of Education. His research and teaching focus on the history and practice of urban university-community-school partnerships and the democratic and civic missions of higher education. As Director of the Netter Center since 1992, Harkavy has helped to develop academically based community service courses, as well as participatory action research projects, that involve creating university-community partnerships and university-assisted community schools in Penn’s local community of West Philadelphia. Harkavy is Chair of the International Consortium on Higher Education, Civic Responsibility, and Democracy; Chair of the Anchor Institutions Task Force, and founder and Chair Emeritus of the Coalition for Community Schools. He has co-edited and co-authored thirteen books, and has written and lectured widely on the history and current practice of urban university-community-school partnerships and strategies for integrating the university missions of research, teaching, learning, and service. Among other honors, Harkavy is the recipient of the University of Pennsylvania’s Alumni Award of Merit, Campus Compact’s Thomas Ehrlich Faculty Award for Service Learning, the New American Colleges and Universities’ Ernest L. Boyer Award, a Fulbright Senior Specialist Award, and three honorary degrees.