This series of annotations of scholarly products between 2004 and 2013 seeks to provide readers with resources and scholarship regarding impact assessments for community-university partnerships. Articles reviewed include those that discuss the evaluation of individual partnerships, as well as those providing more general information and guidance. The document helps to illuminate work that is consistent with the CEC’s mission to mobilize effective partnerships and advance the university’s strategic plan. The annotations will provide a resource to community-engaged faculty at Mason and other higher education institutions.
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Allen, M.L., Culhane-Pera, K.A., Pergament, S. & Call, K.T. (2011). A capacity building program to promote CBPR partnerships between academic researchers and community members. Clinical and Translational Science, 4(6), 428-433.
This paper describes a program that partnered university researchers with community researchers in order to develop culturally-relevant interventions to improve health in the Hmong, Latino and Somali populations. Out of the seven partnerships between faculty and community members, four resulted in funding for projects to improve community health. The researchers also found this this partnership model strongly promoted identification of research needs by community members instead of university faculty.
Azaroff, L.S., Nguyen, H.M., Do, T., Gore, R. & Goldstein-Gelb, M. (2011). Results of a community-university partnership to reduce deadly hazards in hardwood floor finishing. Journal of Community Health, 36, 658-668.
This paper discusses the design, implementation and evaluation of a multi-cultural public health campaign using CBPR. In the community described in the study, many people of limited English proficiency work as wood-finishers and are frequently exposed to flammable and volatile products that can be damaging to their health. Community partners worked with researchers to develop a culturally and linguistically appropriate public health campaign, and over a third of the target population were reached by the advertisements. Over half of the people asked at the end of the public health campaign reported that the campaign caused them to make changes in their choice of materials and chemicals because of safety concerns for themselves and their co-workers.
Balcazar, F.E., et al. (2012). A case study of liberation among Latino immigrant families who have children with disabilities. American Journal of Community Psychology, 49, 283-293.
This article discusses the authors’ project designed to create what they call “empowering community settings” (ECS), which they explain are “community-based structures that facilitate the personal development of its members, community betterment, and positive social change” (Balcazar et al, 2012, 283). They argue that a community-university partnership is perfect to create ECS spaces, and provide a case study in which several Latino families with children who are hearing impaired attended an advocacy training that was part of a federally-funded grant to a local university. Although the parents still experienced many barriers in securing needed services, the project had the effect of empowering them to create a separate advocacy group for Latino families with children with disabilities. The advocacy group started with only 10 families, but within a year had grown to 50 families and over 100 children. The group was active for six years (until most of the children graduated high school).
Baldwin, J.A., Johnson, J.L., & Benally, C.C. (2009). Building partnerships between indigenous communities and universities: Lessons learned in HIV/AIDS and substance abuse prevention research. American Journal of Public Health, 99(51), 577-582.
This article discusses a partnership between indigenous communities and university researchers around HIV/AIDS and substance abuse. The authors report benefits including a breakdown of taboos around these topics for tribal communities and the establishment of more formal mechanisms (such as tribal HIV/AIDS offices to coordinate prevention and treatment initiatives), as well as more culturally relevant research for university faculty.
Berg-Weger, M., Herbers, S., McGillick, J., Rodriguez, C. & Svoboda, J. (2007). Not prepared to care and raising the bar: Case examples of building university-community partnerships in gerontological social work research. Journal of Gerontological Social Work, 50(1-2), 21-38.
The authors discuss a community-university partnership around enhancing services in gerontological social work. They report benefits to the agency and university students and faculty. The university benefitted because of new access to empirical data for research that allowed them to help the agency develop more relevant services. The collaboration between experts on dementia care at the university and practitioners dealing with the issue on the ground allowed for enhanced patient care and better research.
Buys, N., & Bursnall, S. (2007). Establishing university-community partnerships: Processes and benefits. Journal of Higher Education, Policy and Management, 29(1), 73-86.
In this article, the authors discuss the experience of seven academics in who each established a community-university partnership. For the university, it is found that benefits of partnerships include access to new funding sources for research, increased opportunities for transnational research partnerships, more publications, more “cutting-edge” research methodologies and skill sets and new changes to impact practice through research. For students and teachers, there was greater access to opportunities to apply classroom learning in the community, which enhanced the university’s public image.
Doe, S.S. and Lowery, D. (2004). The role of evaluation in developing community-based interventions. Journal of Community Practice, 12, (3-4), 71-88.
This article describes the first stages of a community capacity-building program that consists of four distinct projects: education, neighborhood revitalization, community organizing and economic development. The authors suggest using logic models for program development, and baseline telephone surveys of stakeholders to assess the degree to which the targeted changes are occurring in a community and how engaged the community feels in the program.
Duffy, L.R. (2010). Hidden heroines: Lone mothers assessing community health using photovoice. Health Promotion Practice, 11, 788-797.
The author discusses a photovoice project with single mothers that came about as a result of a community-university partnership. Main outcomes she reports include awareness-raising for community members about the difficulties facing low-income single mothers, as well as personal researcher development.
Frazier, S.L., Abdul-Adil, J., & Atkins, M.S. (2007). Can’t have one without the other: Mental health providers and community parents reducing barriers to services for families in urban poverty. Journal of Community Psychology, 35(4), 435-448.
This article describes the benefits of a community-university partnership that matched local mental health clinicians with community partners to deliver more relevant services to low-income African American families. Community partners and university faculty both reported positive benefits from the partnership-specifically, university faculty expressed that the inclusion of community perspectives in research and scholarship was extremely valuable, and community partners felt expertise from university faculty helped them deliver better services to clients and client systems.
Gutheil, I.A. & Heyman, J.C. (2010). A partnership among a university, foundation and community agencies for training gerontological social workers. Educational Gerontology, 36, 1-11.
As America’s population ages, many professions are recognizing the increased need for professionals who can address the unique needs of the aging population. The authors argue that social work has led the development of models to train practitioners competent in gerontological issues. This article describes a community-university collaboration between a school of social work and community agencies to provide specialized training, as well as the evaluative strategies the researchers used.
Hair, H.J., Shortall, R. & Oldford, J. (2013). Where’s help when we need it? Developing responsive and effective brief counseling services for children, adolescents and their families. Social Work in Mental Health, 11, (1),16-33.
This article assesses the outcome of a brief mental health intervention developed as part of a university-community partnership. The authors used qualitative and quantitative methods to evaluate client outcomes, and found positive benefits for clients about engagement and problem mitigation.
Hart, A. & Northmore, S. (2011). Auditing and evaluating university-community engagement: Lessons from a UK case study. Higher Education Quarterly, 65(1), 34-58.
This article describes one university’s experience in evaluating community-university partnerships. The authors provide a literature review and analyze the existing evaluation frameworks. They also discuss the challenges that institutions face in measuring community and public engagement, especially given the diversity of such activities. They provide a useful framework for categorizing existing partnerships and discuss how these may be applied.
Hites, L.S., et al. (2012). Emergency preparedness training of tribal community health representatives. Journal of Immigrant and Minority Health, 14, 323-329.
This article assesses the effective of a public health emergency preparedness program designed as part of a community-university partnership. Faculty from Dine College of the Navajo Nation and the University of Arizona collaborated to develop a hybrid online and face-to-face certificate program to train Community Health Representatives (CHRs) in Public Health Emergency Preparedness (PHEP). This collaboration allowed the project staff to make adjustments to the pedagogical approach of the program that were responsive to the learning and environmental needs of the CHRs. The program involved six areas of competency related to PHEP, and the CHRs showed improvements in competency in five of these six areas after the program.
Holland, B. (2011). Exploring the challenge of documenting and measuring civic engagement endeavors of colleges and universities: Purposes, issues, ideas. Retrieved from http://www.compact.org/advancedtoolkit/pdf/holland_paper.pdf .
In this working paper, the author discusses frameworks, trends and strategies for assessment of community/university partnerships. She suggests a number of measurement dimensions, including student learning, sustained commitment of schools to engagement, quality of partnership relationships, effects and faculty and community impacts.
Jarvis-Selinger, S., et al. (2008). Social accountability in action: University-community collaboration in the development of an interprofessional aboriginal health elective. Journal of Interprofessional Care, 22(S1), 61-72.
This article describes the development of a course in Aboriginal health at a Canadian university. With input from Native communities, the university was able to develop a course that was culturally relevant and also improve the university’s relationship with local native communities.
Jones, B.L., Pomeroy, E.C. & Sampson, M. (2009). University-community partnerships and community-based participatory research: One community’s approach to enhance capacity in end-of-life and bereavement practice, research and education. Journal of Social Work in End-of-Life and Palliative Care, 5, 94-104.
This article describes a CBPR project designed to better understand grief and loss in social work practice, and to create evidence-based practices around these issues. Using focus groups composed of community members experiencing grief and loss, the researchers identified the community’s priorities related to these issues. They discuss the implications of their findings, including a model of increased community participation in advancing practice around grief and loss.
Kajner, T., Fletcher, F. & Makokis, P. (2011). Balancing head and heart: The importance of relational accountability in community-university partnerships. Innovation in Higher Education, 37, 257-270.
This article discusses the outcomes of a community-university partnership to empower local youth to become health educators in the hope of improving the health outcomes of Aboriginal youth in a Canadian community. The authors describe the partnership and evaluate its effectiveness. They found that, of the eight participants in the program, all completed their training and five of them now conduct health promotion programs in their community full time.
King, G., et al. (2010). Features and impacts of five multidisciplinary community-university partnerships. Health and Social Care in the Community, 18(1), 59-69.
This article discusses impact assessments for five different community-university partnerships in Canada using a standard measure developed by the authors, the Community Impacts Research Oriented Partnerships (CIROP) questionnaire (available online at http://impactmeasure.org/measure.htm). The authors argue that the tool is useful for evaluating multiple types of partnerships.
Lane, J.S. (2012). Engaging preservice music teachers with adult amateur musicians. International Journal of Community Music, 5(3), 317-322.
In this article, the author discusses the results of a community-university partnership that matched students in music education programs with adults who wanted to learn to play musical instruments. In interviews with both music education students and adult learners, the authors found that both saw positive, lasting effects of the program, particularly in the relationships that teachers and learners developed. Further, there were reported benefits for teacher education, such as the immediate and clear feedback that adult learners can give.
LePlatte, D., Rosenblum, K.L., Stanton, E., Miller, N. & Muzik, M. (2012). Mental health in primary care for adolescent parents. Mental Health in Family Medicine, 9, 39-45.
This article discusses the development of the Mom Power program, a community partnership designed to address gaps in healthcare and psychosocial care services for teenage mothers. The authors describe the program and discuss preliminary outcome data from the first 24 participants. The mothers reported improvements in symptoms associated with depression and PTSD, as well as more positive views on their own parenting skills.
Lockwood, D.K., Lockwood, J., Krajewski, E.R. & Wiencek, P. (2011). University and community partnerships: A model of social work practice. The International Journal of Interdisciplinary Social Sciences, 6(1), 39-46.
This article presents outcomes for a community-university partnership designed to build capacity in local community service agencies in the Detroit, MI, area, with special focus on the diverse racial and ethnic populations in that area. The Community Leadership Fellows Program partnered local university faculty with leaders in area community agencies with the aim of capacity-building for program development and youth violence reduction. Community fellows reported overwhelmingly positive outcomes, including increased ability in “developing new programs; getting the technical assistance needed to process, organize and analyze survey data which is helping the organization obtain additional grant funding; raising awareness of problems in the agency and in the community; and learning new skills such as program evaluation and grant writing” (Lockwood et al, 2011, 42-43). University faculty reported that the project helped legitimize community work as part of scholarship and raise awareness of the value of community-driven partnerships. Further, they said that they were able to integrate lessons learned from the experience into the classroom.
Mahoney, J.L., Levine, M.D., & Hinga, B. (2010). The development of after-school program educators through university-community partnerships. Applied Developmental Science, 14(2), 89-105.
In this article, the authors report the benefits of a community-university partnership to train educators for an afterschool program. The partnership allowed community programs that are strapped for resources to better train program staff and develop more relevant and effective programs. Further, the university benefitted through the creation of service learning opportunities for university students.
McCaslin, R. & Barnstable, C.L. (2008). Increasing geriatric social work content through university/community partnerships. Gerontology and Geriatrics Education, 29(1), 1-18.
In this article, the authors discuss and assess efforts to infuse content about geriatrics into social work curricula at the bachelors and masters level. Community members were an integral part of deciding what content was important to the include in the curriculum updates, and the authors examine how well the partnership between the community groups and the university functioned. They offer suggestions for sustaining effective partnerships of this time, as well as ideas about how to ensure changes made to the curriculum regarding gerontology content are maintained.
McNall, M., Reed, C.S., Brown, R. & Allen, A. (2009). Brokering community-university engagement. Innovations in Higher Education, 33, 317-331.
The authors present the results of a study on the linkages between the characteristics of community-university partnerships and the outcomes of those partnerships. They report that successful partnerships that have improved outcomes for clients are related to the “co-creation of knowledge” (McNall et al, 2009, 317), but sharing power between community members and university affiliates has a negative impact on the ability of projects to receive outside funding.
Peterson, T.H. (2009). Engaged scholarship: Reflections and research on the pedagogy of social change. Teaching in Higher Education, 14(5), 541-552.
In this conceptual article, the authors argue that teaching and learning in higher education is transformed through community partnerships. When partnerships appreciate community members’ local knowledge as part of scholarship, students, researchers and educators alike will benefit as they develop new understandings of their educational priorities and academic integrity. They further argue that programs addressing social problems must be developed in tandem wit the communities experiencing the problems, or else the programs will not reach their full potential.
Rozas, L.W. &Negroni, L.K. (2008). University-community partnerships promoting anti-oppressive action on behalf of Latino/a youth. Journal of Community Practice, 16(4), 441-458.
This article discusses the outcomes of a longstanding community-university partnership designed to empower Latino youth in Connecticut. The authors argue that anti-oppressive action must happen in collaboration with the oppressed groups the action is intended to help, as this collaboration will foster local leadership. The partnership discussed in the article has resulted in increased attention to cultural competency in services delivered by CT’s Department of Children and Families.
Sadler, L.S., Newlin, K.H., Johnson-Spruill, I. & Jenkins, C. Beyond the medical model: Interdisciplinary programs for community-engaged health research. Clinical and Translational Science, 4, 285-297. 2011.
This article presents the results of outcome evaluations for four different community-based health promotion interventions (three focused on the health needs of people with diabetes, and one focused on young families with infants and young children). The authors report positive outcomes in each program, as well as lessons learned about community-engaged research.
Spoth, R., Redmond, C., Clair, S., Shin, C., Greenberg, M. & Feinberg, M. (2011). Preventing substance misuse through community-university partnerships: Randomized controlled trial outcomes 41/2 years past baseline. American Journal of Preventive Medicine, 40(4), 440-447.
This article discusses the results of a community-university partnership (PROmoting School-university partnerships to Enhance Resilience (PROSPER) designed to reduce substance abuse and misuse problems. The authors measured outcomes longitudinally over participant lifetimes, as well as self-reported substance use and abuse within the last month and last year. The authors argue that the PROSPER program helped participants reduce their substance misuse and abuse. The authors asserted that the partnership between the community and the university was essential in the success of the program because it allowed them to design a responsive and relevant program.
Strier, R. (2011). The construction of community-university partnerships: Entangled perspectives. The Journal of Higher Education, 62(1), 81-97.
This article discusses a qualitative study assessing the impacts of a community-university partnership around poverty reduction in Haifa, Israel (the Haifa Partnership for the Eradication of Poverty (HPEP). The author reports perceived outcomes for faculty, students, community social workers and clients. The author explains that overall, the partnership allowed participants to exchange roles and better understand the challenges each of them face. Clients saw both individual and larger, systemic-level effects as a result of HPEP. Social workers, students and faculty also reported benefits of individual empowerment as practitioners, real engagement and partnership with clients and more holistic learning and teaching opportunities.
Walker, D.A., Downey, P.M. & Kuehl, D. (2008). Success by degrees: Addressing teacher shortages through a school-community college-university partnership. Community College Journal of Research and Practice, 32(12), 959-969.
This article discusses a partnership between K-12 schools, a community college and a university that was designed to address teacher shortages. The parties worked together to ensure adequate and efficient training and credentialing of teachers, as the K-12 schools identified this as a primary barrier to addressing teacher shortages. The authors argue that the data collected suggest that the partnership is helping schools meet the need for more teachers.
Wittman, A. & Crews, T. ( 2012). Engaged learning economies: Aligning civic engagement and economic development in community-campus partnerships. Retrieved from http://www.compact.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/Engaged-Learning-Economies-White-Paper-20121.pdf.
This white paper from Campus Compact discusses a number of dimensions of community/university partnerships (specifically ones focused on economic development), including strategies for assessment. The authors point out a few successful partnerships around the country and how those partnerships assess their impacts.
Zuiches, J.J. et al. (2008). Attaining Carnegie’s Community-Engagement Classification. The Magazine of Higher Learning, 40(1), pp. 42-45. Retrieved from http://www.changemag.org/Archives/Back%20Issues/January-February%202008/abstract-attaining-carnegies.html.
The article offers information on how to be included in the community-engagement classification system of Carnegie. The layout of Carnegie obliges response in their two major questions in documenting an institution’s community engagement including the Foundational Indicators which require positive answers. The application procedure requires documentation that is broad and essential, concentrated on important qualities, activities and institutional provisions that assures an institutional approach to community engagement. The article also offers recommendations in the pursuance of the system.