Partnerships in Civic Engagement: Cultivating Transformational Campus-Community Relationships Built to Last.
A critical feature of contemporary models of civic engagement is mutually-beneficial collaboration between campus and community partners, in which all members contribute knowledge, skills, and experience to co-create knowledge. To date, most research has focused on student outcomes, and we know much less about how to develop successful campus-community partnerships.
This article reviews the challenges and opportunities in establishing and maintaining these partnerships to address issues in Trenton, NJ, USA. We first review best practices for developing partnerships between potential stakeholders on campus and in the community. We then describe the infrastructure at The College of New Jersey that supports the development of these partnerships and present 3 case studies that highlight how they were maintained to offer a range of civic engagement activities that benefit all stakeholders involved in the collaboration. Finally, we present recommendations for developing and maintaining partnerships at other institutions.
This article describes how staff and faculty at The College of New Jersey and community organizations in Trenton, New Jersey, USA developed campus-community partnerships to
address social issues affecting local populations. Trenton’s history of poverty, juvenile crime, gun violence, unemployment, and other community-level problems provides civic engagement opportunities for local students in a landscape of community organizations eager for collaboration. We present three case studies that highlight how the partnerships developed and were
maintained to offer a range of civic engagement activities that mutually benefit all partners in the collaboration and to illustrate a series of best practices in partnership stewardship. We also present recommendations for developing and maintaining partnerships at other institutions.
Soc Behav Res Pract Open J. 2016; 1(1): 22-33. doi: 10.17140/SBRPOJ-1-105