Abstract: Community Based Participatory Research, Teaching and Service: Lessons Learned From the Homewood Children's Village (Society for Social Work and Research 15th Annual Conference: Emerging Horizons for Social Work Research)
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14135 Community Based Participatory Research, Teaching and Service: Lessons Learned From the Homewood Children's Village

Schedule:
Saturday, January 15, 2011: 10:30 AM
Grand Salon C (Tampa Marriott Waterside Hotel & Marina)
* noted as presenting author
John M. Wallace, PhD, Associate Professor, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA, Aliya Durham, MSW, Urban District Vice President, YMCA Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA and Samantha Teixeira, MSW, Research Associate, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA
Background The Comm-Univer-City of Pittsburgh (CUCoP) is an integrated program of research, teaching and service of the University of Pittsburgh School of Social Work. A core CBPR partnership of the CUCoP is the Homewood Children's Village (HCV). The HCV is a collaborative comprehensive community initiative focused on an economically disadvantaged inner-city neighborhood of Pittsburgh, PA. The HCV is modeled after Geoffrey Canada's internationally acclaimed Harlem Children's Zone, with a mission to “simultaneously improve the lives of Homewood's children and transform the community in which they live.”

Method The HCV involves a broad collaboration of residents, leaders of faith- and community-based organizations, city and county government representatives and local and national funders. In partnership with the HCV, the Comm-Univer-City of Pittsburgh includes a number of community based participatory research (CBPR) projects, a masters level CBPR course that is co-facilitated by a University of Pittsburgh faculty member and a leader of a Homewood based non-profit, and a “cluster” of field placements in various Homewood social service agencies for University of Pittsburgh masters of social work students.

Results In this paper we describe the background of the HCV collaboration, discuss the development of several of the research projects that are a part of the initiative, present selected findings from several of these projects, elucidate a number of the challenges that have arisen in this multi-component initiative and provide recommendations for the creation and sustainability of these kinds of university-community partnerships.

Implications This project illustrates how universities can partner with communities, not only to conduct research, but also to advance their teaching and service missions while building the capacity of residents and community-based organizations to achieve their desired outcomes.