Community Partnerships

Community practice and partnerships are an integral component of UEP. Since our founding in 1973, we have been developing deep community partnerships that are place-based and long-term, particularly with lower income communities of color. These engagements value and involve our partners as co-researchers and co-educators (as co-producers of knowledge). They are a platform for community-engaged learning and research, developing strategies to address critical issues, and building the pipeline of diverse students from partner communities. 

We see community partnerships as mutually beneficial relationships that provide opportunities to join theory and practice to create knowledge that is usable, democratic, and makes a difference in the world. We believe that these partnerships should support communities to drive their own research, share university resources and knowledge, and help build community capacity and power. Community partnership is critical to faculty research, core courses (such as Field Projects), student internships and master's theses, student recruitment (particularly for our mid-career Master of Public Policy program), and student careers.