How the focus of our FLC changed - and stayed the same

The graphic to the left reflects the participatory action research (PAR) process as I understand it - where community partners and university partners are equals in co-creating research projects that are mutually beneficial.  Elements of the PAR process are ver similar to community-based participatory research (CBPR).  For more information on CBPR, click here.


When proposing this FLC, I was interested in weaving in true CBPR principles into the design of the projects FLC members would engage in.  My proposal (see below) was full of CBPR language and philosophy.  My main goal was for the group to center discussions around bringing the community into the classroom and vice versa.  Here was the blurb from my original proposal for this FLC:

The proposed faculty learning community (FLC) will focus on the promotion of student engagement in required research-related courses in the human services – something that often presents a challenge to faculty members in such courses.  For students seeking training in social work, education, occupational therapy, criminal justice or nursing, the goal is often not to foster a research career – but rather to ‘work with people.’  However, as faculty members, we know that the skills learned in statistics and research methods courses are often vital to the development of professionals who can think critically about their work in light of the existing research in their professional arena, engage in program evaluation or interpret basic statistical findings. Given widespread commentary on the research-to-practice gap in the human services, the proposed FLC is designed to begin to bridge the gap between student engagement in research-related courses and the need for human services graduates with basic research-related competencies.  Participants will explore the ways in which they can enliven students’ experiences in the classrooms through the development of curricula that include short and longer-term, hands-on projects.  Drawing on human services literature about bringing the community into the classroom – and the classroom into the community, this FLC will explore the uses of a range of tools, from short, community-based assignments for weekly discussions to the development of community-based participatory research projects aimed at program evaluation, implementation studies or treatment fidelity assessments. 

Application guidelines for potential FLC participants were as follows:

Application process

What will you ask potential participants to submit as an application and how will you make decisions about selecting from among potential applicants? Potential participants in the proposed FLC will be asked to address the following topics in their application:

1.      Current teaching philosophy specifically for research-related courses;

2.      Description of any required community involvement among students in their Department or School

3.      Previous work with community partners in either a service or research-related capacity

4.      Description of the course they plan to work on as part of the proposed FLC (with a syllabus reflective of the current, or traditional approach to teaching the course)

5.      Short essay on why they are inspired to engage in a change process at this particular point in their teaching career, including commentary on the joys and challenges of teaching research related-courses in their professional discipline

While a community focus remained a central tenet in our FLC's discussions, the group did not decide to move in this direction.  To some extent, this was a good thing - people realized that more groundwork needed to be prepared in order to do true, good CBPR - much less add students into the mix.  And students new to the concept of CBPR at that. So, as I wrestled with my role as facilitator at the start of this process, I felt better as we moved in more of a group direction as the weeks went on - a parellel process to the decision to move away from "true" CBPR applications to our courses. 


Speaking about my own proposed project, the conceptualization of which began, to be honest, before the FLC process, the re-framing of an introductory level research methods course for graduate students in social work, I had originally intended to co-teach with a community agency partner who was "research savvy."  The goal would be to help students propose research projects that were truly relevant to our co-teacher's agency - and feasible for completion in the second and third required research courses in our curriculum.  While we currently operate under the same approach vis-a-vis the main assignment being a research proposal, many are very disconnected from the concepts of utility to the field and feasibility...


This idea of co-teaching, however, soon became pie-in-the-sky.  I realized that the timing of the course and the weekly meetings of the course - as well as the problem of payment for a co-teacher (not currently allowed in our contractual structure) were major impediments to this, in retrospect, rather grandiose plan. 

My second idea happened by chance after talking with my FLC members about the CBPR projects I am working on out in Worcester, MA with Youth Opportunities Upheld, Inc. (a.k.a. YOU, Inc.).  This project is separate from my teaching, and a summary of that work can be found either in this blog here or in my own blog here (offering 2 options in case there are linkage issues).  Given that our graduate program has a number of students from the Central MA region (given the lack of affordable, public social work programs in the center of the state), a seed was planted by an FLC colleague who suggested locating the class in question for my FLC project in YOU, Inc. for proximity to my community research partner.  While my YOU, Inc. partner was game for this idea, the logistics of offering a course on such short notice- much less the liability issues, memorandum of understanding process and computer lab access issues made this impossible to implement for Spring 2011 - or Fall 2011, for that matter.  However, this plan is still being worked on for the following academic year.  So, yet again, another pie-in-the-sky (or perhaps more accurately pie-in-my-face) moment.


My third idea was to shift to the evidence-based practice focus discussed elsewhere in this portfolio (click here for a definition).  The idea now became to involve a community agency partner with "research savvy" in key lectures and perhaps to provide feedback to students about their major projects at the end of the semester.  Planned end of semester projects are going to be focused on assessing whether a students' field placement does or does not use evidence-based practice approaches to service delivery - and recommending approaches based on the existing literature.  When vetted with colleagues at the School of Social Work, this seemed much more feasible, although we then received the news that external speaker honoraria had been cut.  I still feel I can find a way with these ideas, though. 


So while I intended to do full-on CBPR, I am very happy with the idea of an intermediate step involving community participation and response to students.  This is about "making it real" to students vis-a-vis how they will and can use research as social work practitioners.  There will be a time for full-on CBPR in our classes, just have to keep building.