Mobilizing Partnerships for Social Change

OVERVIEW
Introduction to CCPH's 9th Conference Important Dates About CCPH About Past CCPH Conferences	Meet the Conference Planning Committee

Introduction to CCPH's 9th Conference continued

Authentic partnerships between communities and campuses are not easy to realize. Many relationships are initiated by the higher educational institution, framed by its academic mission and priorities, and driven by grant and program requirements. In many cases, communities serve in advisory roles. Community-engaged faculty continue to report having few like-minded colleagues on their campuses, and community-based organizations continue to tell stories of cases of "drive-by" research in which faculty get a grant, collect data from community members and leave without a trace. The vast majority of resources for community-campus partnerships - in terms of grant funding, training and technical assistance opportunities and the like - go toward building infrastructure at the academic institutional level, not at the community level. Over the last decade, for example, many colleges and universities have established centers for community-based research, offices of service-learning and senior administrative positions for community partnerships.

Community-based organizations and programs do not usually receive explicit support for their academic roles. As a result, the relationships that form inevitably center around institutional priorities, take a "top down" approach and cease when external funding runs out. Common pitfalls include: the academic institution receives funding based on location in disadvantaged community without involving the community, sharing resources or using them to directly benefit people; students consistently are assigned to tour a neighborhood and conduct needs assessments, without delivering any lasting value to the community involved; faculty members structure community engagements without first assessing community's interests, needs, and assets and fail to plan with community partners; and student and faculty involvement is episodic based on the academic calendar and the availability of funding.

Few colleges or universities have developed a strategic institution-wide approach to community engagement. As a result, they are often involved in conflicting or contradicting activities. For example, a university might be developing strong partnerships with community agencies for service-learning, while at the same time advocating for changes in zoning regulations opposed by community members that would allow the campus to expand into an adjacent low-income neighborhood. Similarly, the community involvement of a university's "undergraduate campus" and "health sciences campus" are often isolated from each other. Colleges and universities located in the same community rarely coordinate their community involvement, thereby competing, duplicating efforts or limiting their potential for long-term impact.

Similarly, few community improvement or revitalization efforts have developed a strategic initiative-wide approach to their engagement of colleges or universities. Community change initiatives might involve students as interns or faculty as a contracted program evaluator, while overlooking the many other resources the academic institutions have to offer. The community's lack of trust and a history of institutional indifference to community voices is often a major contributor to this limited level of campus involvement. Communities frequently identify concerns around unbalanced power and resources, institutional racism, cultural disregard and mistrust when interacting with higher educational institutions.

Although the predominant model of "community-campus partnerships" may not actually be a partnership, exceptions of course do exist. Authentic partnerships are possible when certain facilitating factors and characteristics are in place. For example, when the partnership is formed to address genuine community concern and addresses strategic partner issues; establishes a shared vision and mutually defined goals; builds on prior positive relationships and trust; starts small, with community-based organizations that have a history of engagement and are well respected; explicitly defines who is "the community" and who "represents" the community; has decision making structures and processes that facilitate shared influence and control; has a visionary leader or core group of leaders who are boundary-spanners that understand and appreciate other perspectives, are comfortable sharing ideas, resources & power; and routinely engages in ongoing assessment and improvement.

As we look ahead to the future, we believe a number of features are likely to characterize new models of community-campus partnerships. Community-based organizations will emerge as centers of learning, discovery and engagement, establishing partnerships with a wide variety of disciplines, degree programs and departments in colleges and universities.
Partnerships will be more coordinated and strategic, involving multiple community-based organizations and academic institutions. There will be growth in intermediary organizations that serve to facilitate and support community-campus partnerships, with governance structures and financing mechanisms that equitably distribute power and resources among the partners. Already a global phenomenon, community-campus partnerships around the world and the organizations that represent them will be more deliberate and strategic about collaborating and sharing lessons learned.

The achievement and sustainability of these new models is dependent on a number of factors. First, and perhaps most importantly, communities and campuses must view these partnerships as mission-critical, not as add-ons to their work. Supportive policies are needed at multiple levels. For example, funding agencies that support community-based education and research need to expect community capacity building as an outcome and facilitate the ability of community-based organizations to be the lead applicants; higher educational institutions need to establish faculty promotion and tenure policies that recognize and reward - indeed, recruit and encourage - faculty to engage in community partnerships. Key underlying issues of power, control, history of town/gown struggles and institutional racism need to be tackled head-on. Finally, community-based organizations and programs need to receive explicit support for their academic roles.