In a time of declining federal funding, partnerships that can leverage resources to accomplish complementary goals are vital to creating and maintaining successful communities. HUD's Office of University Partnerships (OUP) has fostered these partnerships by investing funds in institutions of higher education (IHEs), which use these grants to…

Respondents to our 2011 survey on the impact of Community Outreach Partnership Centers (COPC) grants administered by HUD between 1994 and 2005 reported deep and lasting impacts on their respective institutions. These grants affected institutional structures, embedded community engagement within institutional cultures and academic curricula, and…

Rural communities have fewer financial resources, making the community colleges located in these regions central to economic development. This chapter reviews the importance of recognizing the rural differential via policy changes and offers strategies to close the resource gap between rural and nonrural community colleges.

In this report the Quinsigamond Community College (Massachusetts) effort to establish a Community Educational Service Center project, funded by Title I of the Higher Education Act of 1965, is discussed. The primary purpose was to offer special educational services to minority and low-income groups in the local area. The demonstration project was…

The San Francisco State University (California) experience with a federally funded community-outreach program suggests universities are well-suited for certain partnership roles (convener, planner, capacity-builder) but not for others. True university-community partnerships must be built on mutual respect, equal status, and give-and-take;…

The conference convened on June 7, 1981, to study critical issues in rural education, the political and legislative perspectives involved, and resources available for rural educators. The format of the conference consisted of formal addresses and individual discussion sessions. This report includes the formal addresses, covering national…