This article presents an experiential model for community-engaged research that understands communities as living meshworks of embodied human beings, material circumstances, and affective environments. We first trace how community organizations and academics must increasingly respond to a push for hard data. Using an analysis of a national…

Community-based participatory research (CBPR) has emerged as an approach designed to promote community health and well-being through the establishment and maintenance of research partnerships between communities and academic researchers. Rather than the academic researcher assuming what is best for a community, CBPR utilizes community partnerships…

This book presents hands-on information on how to plan, administer, and analyze opinion polls. Guidance is also offered on how to make this strategy accessible to public interest groups. Several examples, checklists, warnings of possible pitfalls, and lists of material and human resources occur throughout the chapters. Major sections address the…

This document reports the methods and results of a study conducted to develop statements of philosophy, goals, and division objectives for Lake Michigan College. The two main sources from which these were developed were: (1) laws, statutes, and constitutional provisions affecting operations of the college, along with existing philosophy and goals;…

This paper describes the process of engaging the extended Indigenous community within Saskatoon and the surrounding First Nations communities in what would be a first major research project between Indigenous communities and the University of Saskatchewan. A management committee was established comprised of all the major Saskatoon/Saskatchewan…

A Teacher Corps-sponsored survey of a rural town in northern Maine is described. The survey was intended to investigate the feelings of town citizens regarding their own lives, the town in which they live, and their school. It was intended to disclose the need for day or foster care centers, to find out about the levels of educational attainment…

Discusses Chicano social scientists' needs identified by Mario Barrera: to use methodological strategies and theoretical models emphasizing researcher's close contact with the people; to research the nature of social and political control systems as applicable to the Chicano community; to define the relations between social scientists and the…

Reports on an Arkansas survey that illustrates a technique for analyzing the school-related concerns and perceptions of teachers and community members. Shows how the survey can identify problem areas in the schools and explains how administrators can use the survey to improve school-community relations. (SB)

This paper focuses on a community's educational improvement project in Tennessee that resulted from executive appointment of a citizen task force in each community. The paper reports project development and results; discussion emphasizes implications for school administrators. A joint task force, appointed in 1985, was directed to develop…

This how-to kit for conducting a survey on the positions women hold in local occupational and decision-making structures is divided into six sections. Section I provides an explanation of the survey and its goals. Section II includes several survey questions and practical tips for finding the answers for each of eleven categories: Law, education,…