Community-university Partnership Research Articles

New frontiers in local government community engagement: Towards transformative place-based futures

In the face of uncertainty and rapid change, how governments at all scales remain valued by society will depend on their ability to connect meaningfully, respond to challenges collaboratively, and co-design approaches with the community. However, tensions exist between the legislative obligations of local government organisations and meeting the rapidly growing needs of diverse communities, while simultaneously navigating the complexities of rapid change. Despite the efforts of local governments to obtain broad and representative input through community engagement processes, communities feel they have limited influence on decision-making processes. Further, Australian trust indices show declining levels of trust between the community, government and large institutions. So how can better community engagement practice be cultivated, evidenced, and continue to evolve to respond in increasingly complex contexts?Presenting a case study in the Sunshine Coast, Queensland, Australia, this article explores how a local government organisation is developing an innovative model of excellence in community engagement in collaboration with a regional university. Grounded in a place-based approach to community engagement, the innovation of this emerging model couples futures studies approaches to co-design locally appropriate responses to navigate increasing uncertainty and change.Drawing on literature from community engagement, participatory governance, futures studies and university-community partnerships, this article outlines a research agenda that explores how communities can strengthen their social and economic potential through place-based and futures thinking approaches.

Indigenous Youth Mentorship Program: essential characteristics of a Canadian multi-site community-university partnership with Indigenous communities.

The Indigenous Youth Mentorship Program (IYMP) is a peer-led health promotion program grounded in the teachings of Indigenous scholars. IYMP is delivered as a multi-sited community-university partnership (CUP) with Indigenous communities across Canada for elementary students. A local young adult health leader and high school youth mentors offer students healthy snacks, physical activity games, relationship building activities and traditional cultural teachings. IYMP aims to improve children's health and wellbeing and empower Indigenous youth and communities. The purpose of this descriptive qualitative study was to describe the essential characteristics of this multi-sited CUP as perceived by the IYMP principal investigators (PIs). Key informant interviews were conducted with 5 IYMP PIs (2 Indigenous) and analysed using content analysis. The overarching theme was forming a community of practice (CoP), where people with a common interest share best practices as they interact regularly. Four sub-themes were shared interest for Indigenous health/wellbeing and social justice, relationships, mentorship and taking a decolonizing research approach. The IYMP CoP allowed mentorship to occur across regions. The essential characteristics that made the IYMP CUPs successful could be used to inform other multi-sited CUPs with Indigenous communities. Those with mutual interests in Indigenous health and partnership with Indigenous communities could consider forming a CoP. Within a newly formed CoP, relationships and mentorship can be developed through discussion and activities. It is imperative within the CoP to take a decolonizing approach to research and acknowledge the impact that colonial policies and practices have had on generations of Indigenous peoples.

Prioritizing partnership: Critical steps towards relationship development for sustaining community-university partnerships

The increase in undergraduate programs in public health within liberal arts institutions in the United States creates an opportunity for community-engaged research with local public health organisations. This type of engagement is one way to connect community members, agency representatives, students, staff, and faculty around social justice organizing efforts that impact entire communities. Authentic relationships and partnerships can reduce real barriers to building bases of support for intervention development, local advocacy efforts, and policy change, to achieve a more just and equitable society.
 This practice-based article describes key steps to partnership development between a private, engaged-teaching liberal arts institution and a local public health nonprofit located in central North Carolina. The partnership was formed to use community-based participatory research (CBPR) approaches to address health equity. To create an authentic CBPR partnership, an intentional partnership development process took place with key steps that were integral to the formation. Structured learning experiences and mentorship provided by previously established CBPR partnerships were critical to partnership development. Shared capacity building experiences, consistent meetings and goal setting facilitated progress. This partnership has lasted since 2015 and continues to grow. Partnership development is an important foundational activity for CBPR and is feasible for local community organizations and undergraduate public health studies departments outside of Schools of Public Health.

Putting the pieces together: critical service learning and social work education

ABSTRACT This phenomenological study explored the experiences of students in a macro practice social work elective, which integrated critical service-learning and creative placemaking. In a community-university partnership, twenty-four students from a variety of disciplines worked with a university Artist in Residence and social work professor to create a participatory mosaic mural in an ethnically diverse and rapidly gentrifying area. Of the 21 students in the class, eight participated in the study and completed hour-long semi-structured interviews. Analysis revealed three primary themes: (1) role and power of art, (2) importance of relationships, and (3) impact of this community engagement class. The findings support the importance of art and community- embedded learning in engaging students. Especially relevant to social work education, student learning focused on cultivating communication and collaboration skills across individuals, groups, and communities. This paper will contribute to the growing body of literature which supports the value of critical service-learning, creative placemaking, and community-based collaborations in social work education.

Rural Community Health: Keeping Michigan's Upper Peninsula Informed During the COVID‐19 Pandemic

During the COVID‐19 pandemic, public health departments and healthcare systems are working to navigate the crisis and protect the community. Those communities in rural areas, where health and communication infrastructure are often limited, face additional challenges in keeping individuals informed, safe, and healthy. Moreover, the amount of misleading information circulating is making it even more difficult to convey critical and rapidly evolving public health recommendations. Michigan Technological University is located in Michigan's rural Upper Peninsula which accounts for 30% of the State's land mass but only 3% of the total population. Our goal was to increase campus and community awareness about COVID‐19 and its impact on health and society.For our rural community, we offered a 1) COVID‐19 public town hall series and 2) COVID‐19 university wide academic course. The public town hall series was delivered weekly and broadcasted live through a webinar (Zoom), social media, and local radio. Each week a speaker panel consisting of public health officials, clinicians, educators, and/or other local experts discussed a COVID‐19 topic theme and answered questions from the community. The academic course was presented as a 1‐credit seminar‐based online course open to any student. Each week students explored a COVID‐19 related topic, participated in the weekly town hall, and engaged in follow‐up discussion and reflection. Primary course learning objectives were for students to locate credible COVID‐19 information sources and describe what is known about the general health impacts of the disease.Twelve public town halls, that included more than 35 different presenters, were delivered. Number of attendees on the Zoom webinars ranged between 20‐75 individuals with many others interacting with content through social media, radio, and the recorded content. Town hall themes included the role of public health to protect community health, impact of disease on physical and mental health, health disparities, mechanisms to interrupt and halt transmission, and strategies for adapting to lifestyle changes. Undergraduate and graduate students (n=37) from a variety of majors (biology, exercise science, chemistry, engineering, business, forestry) enrolled in the course. Nearly all students (96%) reported that the course increased their awareness about COVID‐19 and the majority (61%) indicated that the course was the most effective way to obtain COVID‐19 related information. All students recommended that other students take this course in the future.The public town hall series provided a robust platform to deliver critical, real‐time health information to our campus and broader community during the COVID‐19 pandemic. Additionally, students perceived that the academic course increased their awareness of COVID‐19. Increased public health messaging is a critical step to keeping Michigan's rural Upper Peninsula informed, safe, and healthy during the COVID‐19 pandemic and may serve as a model for other rural university‐community partnerships.

Is the Scholarship of Engagement a Meaningful Approach to Foster Change in Community Development Education? Field Notes from Three Community/University Partnerships

Pedagogical approaches in community-engaged education have been the object of interest for those aiming at improving community health and well-being and reducing social and economic inequities. Using the epistemological framework provided by the scholarship of engagement, this article examines three nationally recognized and successful examples of community-university partnerships in the fields of community planning and public health: the East St. Louis Action Research Project, the South Memphis Revitalization Action Project, and the Detroit Community-Academic Urban Research Center. We review and compare how these partnerships emerged, developed, and engaged students, community partners, and academic researchers with their local communities in ways that achieved positive social change. We conclude by highlighting common elements across the partnerships that provide valuable insights in promoting more progressive forms of community-engaged scholarship, as well as a list of examples of what radical forms of community-engaged education may look like.

Virtual Internships in Health and Human Services: Practices and Strategies for Planning During the Pandemic

The pandemic has had a significant impact on the work of many family and consumer sciences (FCS) professionals and those in related fields across the world, including college student interns. Across disciplines, it is well established that quality internships can help students enhance their professional development, networking, and multicultural skills; internships also can enhance university–community partnerships (Horney et al., 2016; Simons et al., 2012). Yet, during the pandemic, many students who had secured internships, including in essential work fields, found themselves struggling to secure sites. At the same time, many students needed the internship to graduate on time; thus, we knew we needed to create an internship pandemic plan. FCS is an applied science (AAFCS, n.d.), therefore many of us have been trained to think creatively about how to relay research-based information to community audiences. Similarly, it is in our backgrounds to create opportunities for university–community partnerships and to train students to do the same. In this paper, we focus on the ways the pandemic pushed us to come together as applied scientists and educators to create virtual internships and train students to be applied scientists.

Can public universities play a role in fostering seed sovereignty?

Across Canada and the United States, public universities were founded with a mission to contribute to broad societal well-being. Yet, the capacity of public research institutions to develop and disseminate flexible and accessible tools for resilient agriculture has been challenged in recent decades. The role of universities in advancing extractive, rather than regenerative, economies has been amplified by the privatization of public agricultural research and extension of knowledge to farmers, particularly in plant breeding and plant genetics. In this article, we examine the history of public research for seed systems in North America through a “seed regimes” framework, arguing that a narrow focus on commercialization of public research has exacerbated inequalities inherent in the founding structure of public agricultural research, including the displacement of Indigenous land and seed relations. We then discuss how community organizations are challenging the enclosure of seed through seed sovereignty organizing and freelance plant breeding, in some cases through the development of community–university partnerships based on the principles of the cocreation of knowledge. We conclude by offering a reimagined public seed research agenda that focuses on strengthening links between public research and grassroots seed movements, as an opportunity to build more resilient seed and food systems.

Community College and University Partnerships for the Political Science Major

Community College and University Partnerships for the Political Science Major

University public-private partnerships for addressing student emergency needs: A literature review.

University-community partnership is an effective strategy for improving a university's disaster resiliency and preparedness.1 In times of disaster, having established partnerships with organizations in the community ensures a timely response to students' needs and reduces the cost of disaster management efforts. The purpose of this study is to understand the current state of knowledge on coordinated and collaborative disaster management efforts, such as public-private partnerships, for addressing the needs of university students in the event of a natural disaster (eg, a hurricane). We conduct a literature review of published works using four keywords of partnership, university, hurricane, and student. The emergent pattern in the published work shows weak signs of university-community partnerships for addressing the needs of university students during a natural disaster, and few case studies focus on the needs of this vulnerable population. We further discuss the main findings and recommendations in the findings section. Future research should use this holistic literature review as a blueprint for understanding the research gaps on collaborative disaster management for university students.

A Community-University Partnership to Develop and Implement an Enhanced Model of Coaching for Prekindergarten

The effects of high-quality pre-kindergarten programs are well documented, including improvements in cognitive, literacy, math, and social-emotional skills. Evidence shows that low-income and minority students tend to benefit most from these programs, potentially helping to reduce academic performance disparities. A commonly employed intervention to improve pre-k classroom quality is coaching; however, there is little consensus regarding what coaching should “look like” in early childhood education and a great deal of variability in coaching quality. This paper describes a community-university partnership to develop a coaching model for a publicly funded prekindergarten program, using a participatory research approach and seeking input from stakeholders at multiple levels to address the particular needs of the school district. This paper describes the origin of the partnership, the development and implementation of the coaching model, and the benefits of using this type of collaborative approach to pre-k coaching. Taking a collaborative approach to the development and implementation of a pre-k coaching model resulted in an intervention that met program needs, achieved buy-in from multiple levels of administrators and staff, and helped build the school district’s capacity to use data to guide decision-making. Challenges encountered throughout the project, how those challenges were addressed, and steps taken to ensure the sustainability of the coaching model are also discussed.

Families and Schools Together: Designing a Model for University-Community Partnerships to Support Home-School Collaborations

Collaboration between school staff, families, and community partners is vital for ensuring all students’ success, particularly those with disabilities. In this case study, we will discuss a community-university partnership involving a university school psychology graduate program, several local school districts, and a specialized medical facility for children with autism and related neurodevelopmental disorders. These partners came together to create the Families and Schools Partnership Program (FSPP). Facilitated by School Psychology faculty and graduate students, FSPP offers support to families and schools through a cohesive multidisciplinary approach to intervention. In this study, we examined the experiences of 700 families referred to the FSPP consultation team and evaluated the reasons for referral, levels of intervention required by each family, and case outcomes. As a result, we offer a series of steps and tips for developing collaborative interagency relationships, an outline of the consultation framework and processes developed, and lessons learned throughout implementation.

Designing an Engaged Swarm: Toward a Techne for Multi-Class, Interdisciplinary Collaborations with Nonprofit Partners

This essay proposes a model of university-community partnership called “an engaged swarm” that mobilizes networks of students from across classes and disciplines to work with off-campus partners such as nonprofits. Based on theories that translate the distributed, adaptive, and flexible activity of actors in biological systems to organizational networks that include humans, swarms are well-suited to providing a diverse range of responses to complex problems. As such, swarming tactics can be useful when applied to nonprofit organizations that do not have the capacity or time to redesign their communications strategy across print, web, and social media platforms. Employing a case study of three classes that collectively produced a wide range of multimedia artifacts for a nonprofit in a single semester, the essay illustrates how a swarm embedded within a university operates, and concludes by providing a schema for modifying swarms to future partnerships.

The Powerful Potential of Relationships and Community Writing

The following essay is a collective reflection in which the authors revisit the themes they raise in the edited volume Unsustainable, ask new questions, and suggest, again, that long-term sustainability might not be the most appropriate goal for every university-community partnership. Still, relationships, with all their variability, remain the lifeblood of community writing work. Just as the Conference on Community Writing (CCW) was a welcome opportunity to reconnect with old friends and learn new names, our programs are built on the strength of the relationships we build in the community and on our campuses.

CCCC Statement on Community-Engaged Projects in Rhetoric and Composition

Preamble The Conference on College Composition and Communication (CCCC) represents teachers and scholars of writing and speaking whose work in and beyond colleges and universities regularly extends to sites for online learning, professional workplaces, and both near and far-flung communities. This statement provides guidelines for understanding, assessing, and valuing the community-engaged work colleagues may undertake across career stages, ranks, and roles. As such, it underscores the worth community-engaged work can have for individual participants, participating campuses, and disciplines associated with CCCC. As a resource for both faculty and administrators, this statement, we hope, will serve to credit teachers, researchers, and programs appropriately for their contributions to university-community partnerships that are anchored in rigorous scholarship and designed to enhance community capacity. This statement echoes others in related fields, which offer similar frameworks for valuing and evaluating academic community engagement.

Interdisciplinary Service Learning as a Critical Knowledge Transaction Space in University-Community Engagement

In this article we present a framework for interdisciplinary service learning as border pedagogy grounded on Dewey’s educational philosophy and critical social theory. The project Stoa Malakopi allowed design and social science students from two universities in the US and Greece to collaborate in a necessity-driven field of inquiry through engagement with local knowledge. Evaluation showed that students embraced polyphony, reflexivity and situational problem solving as conditions for meaningful university-community partnerships.

Transdisciplinary Translational Science for Youth Health and Wellness: Introduction to a Special Issue

BackgroundTransdisciplinary translational science applies interdisciplinary approaches to the generation of novel concepts, theories and methods involving collaborations among academic and non-academic partners, in order to advance the translation of science into broader community practice.ObjectiveThis paper introduces a special issue on transdisciplinary translational science for youth health and wellness. We provide an overview of relevant research paradigms, share the related goals of the Iowa State University Translational Research Network (U-TuRN), and introduce the specific papers in the issue.MethodAuthors were asked to submit empirical reports, programmatic reviews or policy-related papers that examined youth health issues from a transdisciplinary translational perspective.ResultsThe papers included in this special issue each involve direct and fully-integrated community-university partnerships and collaborations between academic and non-academic partners in scholarship and research. Reports emphasize the value of the applied nature of the work with a research agenda driven primarily by real-world health and social needs.ConclusionsThere is growing acceptance of the need for transdisciplinary, community-university collaborative research approaches as a means to meet both the requirements posed by real-world problems as well as goals of advancing scientific knowledge and innovation. In this issue, readers will find papers that show the promise of rethinking existing conceptual frameworks to incorporate transdisciplinary approaches as a catalyst to addressing translational science questions related to the field of children and youth care.

A Community-University Partnership: Responding to COVID-19 in South Africa via the University of Pretoria's Community Engagement Initiative

A Community-University Partnership: Responding to COVID-19 in South Africa via the University of Pretoria's Community Engagement Initiative

Interdisciplinary Health Care Professionals’ Perceptions of the Causes and Consequences of the Opioid Crisis: Developing Rural Community Partnerships to Increase Access to Naloxone

Opioid overdoses kill thousands of people each year, and overdose rates continue to increase. Community-university partnerships are desperately needed to provide the multipronged and multiagency responses demanded by the opioid crisis. In this study, community and university partners used a consensual qualitative research approach to analyze survey results from continuing medical education sessions in rural communities. The health care providers surveyed had variable attitudes toward the opioid crisis, ranging from empathy for patients’ situations to denial that an opioid crisis exists. The voices of these professionals are critical to community partners’ ongoing work to address the opioid crisis. Data from this study supported the formulation of subsequent programming for health care professionals and community members as well as the launch of fruitful opioid-focused partnerships. Understanding health care professionals’ perceptions of the opioid crisis will allow public health and university teams to provide effective interventions in opioid prescription, naloxone distribution, and stigma reduction to ultimately lessen opioid dependency and overdose.

Developing Evaluable Principles for Community-University Partnerships

As post-secondary institutions across the globe have identified community engagement as a central component of their visions and missions, the interest in measurement and evaluation at the institutional level has increased over the past few decades. Yet the complex, distributed, dynamic and ever-changing nature of community-university engagement poses a number of evaluation challenges. The purpose of this paper is to explore a possible evaluation match called Principles-Focused Evaluation (Patton, 2018) that uses principles as the core evaluand as opposed to specific projects, programs, or initiatives as the focus of evaluation. Principles, when clearly and meaningfully articulated, welcome complexity and provide direction to guide action and behaviour towards desired results within a variety of contexts, without prescribing specific activities or models for what should be done and how. The focus of the article is to articulate a set of effectiveness principles for community-university partnerships that reflect both university and community interests, which is the first step in a principles-focused formative evaluation process. Next steps for a principles-focused evaluation are outlined in order to determine to what extent the process of engaging in community-university partnerships in a principled way is contributing towards the desired results of community-university engagement at the institutional level.