The author's previous articles for "FORUM," some co-authored with Dr. Andrew Allen, propose a radical restructuring of English schooling to enable more effective engagement with the community and a reassessment of the purposes of schooling. What follow here are a few suggestions that individual schools and academy trusts might take up to…

Over the past 10-15 years, the Volunteer Program at the Natural History Museums of Los Angeles County has undergone an immense transition. This program overhaul tackled historical methodology that had been creating barriers to participation, addressed the changing needs of modern volunteer audiences, and worked to highlight access and inclusion in…

Community-engaged teaching is a cornerstone of leading parks, recreation, and tourism programs. This paper uses a capstone project for upper-level tourism students as a case study of how one class adapted community-engaged learning during the COVID-19 pandemic. Changes included moving all communications to a virtual format and the addition of more…

The multifaceted influences of coloniality in higher education continue to be explored to reshape and transform spaces that can either reproduce structures of coloniality or bring about decoloniality. The University of Puerto Rico was founded in 1903 within 5 years of the end of the Spanish-American War, as a product of the law Morrill-Hatch. The…

This Projects With Promise case study offers insights for addressing tensions between universities and communities in building partnerships and collectively rethinking "the field" of community engagement. We explore moving beyond a solely place-based understanding of "the field" into an ethos based on human interactions and…

In this theoretical article, we respond to a common education policy discourse that represents community participation in educational policy-making as an essentially rational solution to policy problems and as inherently progressive and democratic. We propose that conceptualising participatory politics as 'publics' challenges this discourse and…

This study examines the potential of community schools to revolutionize the educational landscape by creating a more impactful and locally tailored ecosystem. Through Action Research methodology, the research explores how deep community engagement can reshape educational experiences, focusing on the Flexible Pathways Initiative that empowers…

This new report documents 10 years of Space to Grow, celebrating this dynamic program's significant impact on Chicago schools, neighborhoods and the environment. From transforming schoolyards into vibrant, multifunctional spaces that foster learning, play, connection to nature, and community engagement, to helping mitigate flooding, Space to Grow…

Background: Across families from all backgrounds, and for all students, when parents and the broader community engage in sustained systematic program improvements, schools and districts are more likely to focus on and maintain improvements. As a result, federal and state lawmakers have implemented engagement mandates. The ways in which these…

Iowa BIG is a system of high schools located in Cedar Rapids, Iowa in the United States which emerged from community rebuilding efforts following catastrophic flooding in the city. The aim of this case study is to highlight Iowa BIG's complexity by describing how it functions as a: (1) school system; (2) vision for student-centric learning; and…

At the intersection of the fields of engagement and organization development lie the strategies, structures, and processes of community-engaged praxis. This qualitative inquiry focused on the experiences of community engagement professionals at an urban, state-related research university. This study provided an understanding of the activities that…

This research aims to (1) study the current state and needs of the community to enhance participation in Community Learning centres (CLCs) in Cambodia, and (2) consider the required coverage of guidelines to enhance community participation in CLCs. The research utilized a mixed-method design which conducted a survey with a sample of 28 CLC…

In their quest to further their understanding of the power of plática (authentic dialogue) in community engagement efforts, the researchers/practitioners embedded themselves in deep, critical conversations with family leaders from a community-based organization on issues of equity and excellence in education. The researchers/practitioners…

Although the Belmont Report and associated federal regulations were written to protect individual research participants from undue risk and harm, Community-Based Participatory Research teams are concerned about insufficient protection of ethical concerns on a community level. This multi-case study examines the process institutional actors at two…

Mexican American educational history has become a vibrant field of study since the late 1980s. In the last seven years, however, it is notable that this research has inspired community-based efforts to preserve and publicly commemorate challenges to unequal education. In this commentary, we discuss the archival recovery of the "Francisco…