scholarly journals 4481 Better Together Harrisburg: Community-Driven Research Day

2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (s1) ◽  
pp. 81-82
Author(s):  
Andrea Murray ◽  
Martha Wadsworth ◽  
Jennifer Kraschnewski ◽  
Kathleen Best ◽  
Carmen Henry-Harris

OBJECTIVES/GOALS: The overall goal of the Community-Engaged Research Core, supported by the Penn State Clinical and Translational Science Institute, is to invest in opportunities that promote collaboration between researchers and communities. Research in which community members are participating in the research process will more likely lead to reducing health disparities when compared to more traditional approaches. This abstract describes a community research day that brought researchers and community-based organizational leaders together to discuss critical areas of research. We aim to highlight a successful approach for how to work with a community, particularly one that has been distrustful of research, to facilitate and support collaborations between academic researchers and community-based organizational leaders (CBOs). Community-based organizational leaders are often the most knowledgeable individuals when it comes to identifying and discerning the needs and research priorities of their communities and they are generally in the best positions to help build greater trust between academic researchers and communities. METHODS/STUDY POPULATION: A Community Research Day Steering Committee was formed in the spring of 2018 and consisted of 10 community-based organizational leaders from Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, two Penn State University staff, and one Penn State University faculty member. The Steering Committee’s purpose was to design, plan, and execute an event (Better Together: Community Driven Awareness) in which community-organizational leaders and faculty researchers came together to discuss possible research collaborations to improve community health. The Steering Committee participated in bi-monthly planning meetings leading up to the event, Better Together: Community-Driven Awareness. During these planning meetings, members determined that mental health and nutrition were two critical areas deserving of more attention from research within their geographical community. Organizations were asked to identify sub-categories within mental health and nutrition that they saw as most relevant to their communities. The sub-categories that they selected became the theme topics for round table discussions at the main event. This information was also used to determine which academic researchers to invite to the event, based on scientific expertise. In addition to selecting these topics for table discussions, the Steering Committee provided advice on the agenda and program materials. The agenda for Better Together: Community-Driven Awareness featured a presentation from a successful collaboration between a faculty member and a community-based organization whose project was centered around suicide prevention in the school system. After the presentation, researchers and CBOs sat at round tables for facilitated discussions about their table’s theme. The facilitated discussions fostered new relationships and led to collaborations outside of the event. Following the round-table discussions, there was a presentation about funding and next steps. Lastly, feedback forms were given to each attendee to assess their experience of the event and to better understand what to improve upon for the future. RESULTS/ANTICIPATED RESULTS: Following the Community-Driven Awareness event, the Community-Engaged Research Core at Penn State released a call for proposals for planning grants to be awarded to faculty/community-based organization teams. These grants were intended to build capacity for externally-funded research that seeks to address important community-identified research questions. The internal grants support meetings to discuss mutual interests, develop research questions, identify leaders, conduct literature reviews, and collect pilot data. A team must have included, at a minimum, one Penn State faculty researcher and one community-based organizational leader as co-principal investigators. In the proposal, the team was asked to describe its preliminary research question, the work to be accomplished during the planning period, anticipated outcome(s) and deliverables, and preliminary ideas for seeking future external funding. A two-page narrative briefly described how the team members’ expertise/experience/constituencies would address the specified research question. In addition, the team provided a budget and budget justification. Planning grants ranged from $500-$5,000. Funds were allocated for a 6-12 month period. After the call was sent out, seven proposals were submitted and three were selected for external funding. Proposal topics included: * Exploring the Mechanism of Engagement in HIV Testing, Prevention, and Care Among African American and Hispanic/Latino Men who Have Sex with Men * Educator Translation of a Universal Social-Emotional Learning Program in School Practice * Growing Nutritious Communities: Gardening to increase access to and knowledge about fresh fruits and vegetables among residents in South Harrisburg, Hall Manor community. DISCUSSION/SIGNIFICANCE OF IMPACT: There are several academic institutions that have implemented similar events whose goal is to bring together academic researchers and community-based organizational leaders. To our knowledge, this is one of a few examples of an event that was developed from the ground up by a committee comprised mostly of community organization leaders. The community leaders guided the decisions made in all phases of the event design from determining the research themes to providing input on program materials. Additionally, our Steering Committee garnered the interest and attendance from over 20 community participating organizations, which attests to their commitment and dedication to seeing this event through from beginning to end. The feedback received from the event was overwhelmingly positive. Both academic researchers and community-based organizational leaders expressed their appreciation for an event that brought both parties together in a space where they felt comfortable to share ideas and knowledge. When asked how we could improve this event in the future, most attendees shared that they wanted more time and more opportunities to connect. One limitation of the event noted by attendees was that attendees were not able to sign up for the round table discussions themselves but were placed strategically at them by our Steering Committee. Therefore, at our next event, attendees will be able to select their tables and determine which themed topic they prefer to participate in. Lastly, we are considering how to best summarize the ideas that are generated from these round table discussions in a way that can be shared with the larger group and in a way that might foster collaborations outside of the event.

2013 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 52-74 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eve Tuck ◽  
Mistinguette Smith ◽  
Allison M. Guess ◽  
Tavia Benjamin ◽  
Brian K. Jones

In this article, researchers from an academic institution and researchers from a community-based organization theorize a recent collaboration. This “contingent collaboration” was designed to analyze interviews that had been conducted by the community organization and required the purposeful negotiation of two thresholds, one methodological, the other empirical. Writing together across diverse experiences with academic research, the authors consider the implications of the settler colonial roots of social science, the voyeuristic tendencies of academic researchers, and the historical presence of Black people as “other” in the academy for academic-community research partnerships.


2019 ◽  
Vol 42 (3) ◽  
pp. E35-E39
Author(s):  
Gideon Koren ◽  
Linoy Gabay ◽  
Joseph Kuchnir

Purpose: Research training for clinicians is becoming relatively common for postdoctoral trainees in academic institutions. In contrast, there are relatively few such training programs for family physician residents. The purpose of this article is to describe a novel program for family medicine trainees in Maccabi Health Services, a large Israeli health fund. Methods: Following organizational approval and budget allocation, a call for family residents resulted in 18 applications, 15 of whom were selected for a two-year research training program. Each trainee submitted a research proposal, dealing with a community- based research question. Each protocol was allocated a budget. The Program, overseen by a steering committee of family physicians and scientists, has a designated clinical epidemiologist who coordinates all activities. The Project runs monthly face-to-face meetings where trainees present their research proposals. The group reviewed the protocols ahead of time, commented on them and criticized them. In parallel, the trainees participate in a detailed discussion of their research proposals face-to-face with the program director and clinical epidemiologist, and the revised research proposal is submitted to the Institution Review Board. Results: The Program received enthusiastic responses from the trainees and from Maccabi Health Services, which has already approved the budget for the second year of the Program with a new stream of trainees. The approved research proposals dealt with original and important community-based clinical questions. Conclusions: With the aim of developing clinician-researchers in the field of family medicine, this novel program will help change the research climate in a large organization, where community-based family practitioners were not typically involved in research.


2021 ◽  
Vol 43 (4) ◽  
pp. 31-37
Author(s):  
Cheryl Cowan ◽  
Kalyn Mumma ◽  
Johnny Nguyen ◽  
A.J. Faas

Abstract Universities and community-based organizations partner to provide benefits to students and to communities where universities are situated. We examine the core elements of a successful partnership in a case study of an ongoing collaboration between San José State University (SJSU) and Japantown Prepared, a community-based organization whose mission is to advance disaster preparedness at the household and community level within San José, California’s, historic Japantown. We demonstrate these core elements of success through a discussion of the development and execution of several projects designed to build capacity within Japantown Prepared and provide real-world experience for Organizational Studies students at SJSU. We conclude that the relationship between SJSU and Japantown Prepared meets the core elements of a successful partnership and provide further suggestions for its continued success.


2021 ◽  
pp. 016146812110519
Author(s):  
Bic Ngo ◽  
Diana Chandara

Background/Context: Community-based youth theater programs afford youth opportunities to explore and “author” new identities by “performing writing.” Yet, we know much less about the ways in which immigrant youth are exploring struggles and changes within their families and ethnic community. We particularly lack research about the roles of immigrant adult educators in youth programs, and the significance to the pedagogical process of their experiences, being, and modes of interacting with young people who share with them a common ethnicity. Purpose/Objective/Research Question/Focus of Study: The purpose of the study is to explore the role of a community-based Hmong immigrant educator as a “nepantlera,” or boundary-crossing “guide” in Hmong youth’s negotiation of culture and identity. It is guided by three questions: (1) How does nepantlera pedagogy move beyond self–other dichotomies? (2) How does nepantlera pedagogy facilitate rewriting the self to construct new visions of ethnic identity? and (3) How does nepantlera pedagogy entail risking the personal? Setting: The research setting was a Hmong community-based arts organization in an urban center in the Midwestern United States. Population/Participants/Subjects: Three 1.5-generation Hmong American adult staff of a community-based organization, one Korean American teaching artist from a local theater company, and 11 second-generation Hmong American adolescents participated in the study. Research Design: The study draws from a critical ethnographic investigation of the culturally relevant practices of a youth theater project within a Hmong coethnic organization. Data Collection and Analysis: Ethnographic data collection occurred over the 4-month program cycle of the theater project. Data sources include field notes from participant observations, semi-structured interviews, audio and video recordings of the activities, work products, and documents about the program and organization. The data were analyzed with thematic analysis techniques. Findings/Results: The findings suggest that the nepantlera pedagogy of the Hmong immigrant educator fostered opportunities for Hmong youth to (1) disrupt binaries between first-generation and second-generation immigrants by exploring not only differences but also commonalities; (2) imagine new ethnic selves by exploring and rewriting a Hmong edict against same-last-name relationships; and (3) experience the vulnerability of their Hmong educator through disclosure about his personal life. Conclusions/Recommendations: The nepantlera pedagogy of an immigrant educator within a coethnic community-based organization brings a perspective from the nepantla, or “in-between,” of culture and identity that provides immigrant youth with a deeper level of cultural knowledge and connectedness to navigate their multiple worlds.


Author(s):  
Stewart Sutherland

Research on Indigenous people has moved from looking in on a subject to having the subjects as research partners, alongside academic researchers. Community-based research has a number of ethical requirements that means research partners have a voice. How this voice is captured, stored, and distributed is of great importance. For many publishers, academic or institutional, the voice of the layman or grassroots organisations are not valued. This results in much work going unpublished and hence being poorly archived. Often the stories of community are told with an earthy richness that is lacking in academic writing. This is partly due cultural storytelling, not writing to the rigidity of academia. This chapter will discuss a variety of methods that can be employed to raise the voice of community research partners who may not be academics and academically minded. However, the stories of our partners are important and are just as valid as those of the academic researcher.


2017 ◽  
Vol 1 (S1) ◽  
pp. 47-48
Author(s):  
Amy LeClair ◽  
Carolyn Rubin ◽  

OBJECTIVES/SPECIFIC AIMS: Addressing Disparities in Asian Populations through Translation research (ADAPT) is a community-research partnership funded by the Tufts Clinical Translational Sciences Institute (CTSI). Founded in 2011, this collaborative brings together 7 Chinatown-serving community-based organizations and academic researchers with the goal of improving health for the local Chinatown community and beyond. The goal of this research project was to document the best practices, lessons learned, and process through which ADAPT has developed and grown. The aim of this project is to disseminate the model to other CTSAs who are currently engaged in METHODS/STUDY POPULATION: We used a combination of qualitative interviews and content analysis to gather data on the evolution of ADAPT over the last 5 years. Current members from both community organizations and the university/medical center were interviewed about their experiences participating in ADAPT. When possible, interviews were recorded and transcribed verbatim. Deidentified transcripts and administrative documents including meeting minutes, conference summaries, bylaws, and mission statements were coded using Dedoose analytic software. RESULTS/ANTICIPATED RESULTS: Established community-based participatory research (CBPR) principles, including mutual respect, transparency, and commitment, are viewed as necessary, but not sufficient. Patience—both with other members and with the group as a work in progress—is highlighted as being a necessary characteristic of participants. Time and funding are 2 of the most important resources, and the majority of members agree that there is no substitute for “skin in the game.” Attempts at last minute, opportunistic engagement were provided as examples of what had not worked. One ongoing tension is the balance between process and product. Individual members are beholden to organizations to different degrees, and the need to produce something in the form of publications or grant money can limit the amount of time members can commit to the collaborative. At the same time, these products are unlikely to materialize if members are not invested in the process of growing and sustaining the collective. DISCUSSION/SIGNIFICANCE OF IMPACT: Out of the 7 community organizations who currently participate in ADAPT, only 1 is explicitly focused on health in the traditional sense. The others are primary service organizations, but because they understand the impact of the social determinants of health on the local community—including housing, employment, education, nutrition, among other factors—the research collaborative is able to leverage the knowledge and expertise of the academic researchers and the community partners to focus on health topics most salient to the local Chinatown community.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Axel Vera ◽  
Franklin Avilés Vázquez ◽  
Edward Badding

Squire J. Booker is an Evan Pugh University Professor of Chemistry and of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at Pennsylvania State University (Penn State). He obtained a Ph.D. in biochemistry from MIT under Prof. JoAnne Stubbe. Prof. Booker’s research on radical-dependent enzymes has unraveled some mechanisms of antibiotic resistance and natural product biosynthesis, and he was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 2018. He is also an advocate for promoting diversity in science. He created and co-directs the Penn State Department of Chemistry Summer Research Experience for Undergraduates (REU) program, which allows 10 undergraduate students from the United States to conduct chemical research on the topic of “catalysis and motion” every year at Penn State. The program mainly recruits women, students from underrepresented groups, and students from universities and colleges that lack strong research infrastructure. Prof. Booker is also on the steering committee of the Annual Biomedical Research Conference for Minority Students (ABRCMS), one of the largest professional conferences for underrepresented students with over 5000 yearly attendees, and is the Chair of the ABRCMS Chemistry Division. Here, we learn about Prof. Booker’s trajectory in science, how he became a faculty member, and his efforts to increase diversity in science. This interview was edited for clarity.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document