Portland State University recently announced Megan Horst, Staci Martin and Kacy McKinney as recipients of the 2023 Community Engagement and Research Academy (CERA) grants.
CERA serves as a hub for research on the impact of the University’s community engagement work and promotes academic and community engagement under the guiding principles of the PSU’s mission to serve and enhance the community.
Associate Professor and the Director of the Masters of Urban and Regional Planning Program in the Toulan School of Urban Studies and Planning, Megan Horst–along with research partner and Senior Instructor of Urban Studies and Planning, Moriah McGrath–will be conducting the study, Assessing the Experience of Host Organizations for Masters of Urban and Regional Planning [MURP] Internship and Community Development Field Experience Students. This project will survey and interview close to 200 organizations that have hosted MURP, as well as interviewing students completing internships, community studies and field work. Horst’s goal is to evaluate these organization's benefits, challenges and costs for student hosting, as well as the support requests and resources these organizations require from the Toulan School.
School of Social Work Assistant Professor of Practice, Staci Martin’s project, Exploring the Impact of Community Engaged Work Through Arts-Based Methods with Child, Youth, and Family Studies Practicum Students, Community Partners, and Community Members, focuses on the impact of community-engaged work at their practicum sites. Martin’s project applies Speaking for Ourselves Action Research (SOAR) methodology, including participants as co-researchers, positioning them as authorities of their own experiences, and further developing their awareness of systemic issues to move them to social action. The results of this research will be displayed at an art show that presents practicum students, community partners and/or community members' collaborative work on racial and social justice issues.
The Toulan School’s Kacy McKinney’s study, Enhancing Our Ability to Measure the Impact of Community Engaged Work Changing the Narrative Impact Study Stage 2, follows McKinney’s 2020 community-based comic book production research project, Changing the Narrative: Stories of Student Homelessness and Housing Instability. Phase 1 of Mckinney’s project–also funded by CERA in 2022–sought to measure, understand and document, anecdotally, the impacts this project had on the people who made it happen: staff and vendors at Street Roots newspaper, staff at the Independent Publishing Resource Center, staff at The Downstairs Gallery, storytellers, project artists, and research participants. Phase 2 of McKinney’s project will apply a “creative reflection process” primarily with Street Roots’ vendors, the primary points of contact with thousands of people who purchased the resulting comic book from McKinney’s initial project. By conducting in-person surveys as well as a series of focus groups, McKinney will measure the impact of her 2020 project, “...through the experiences and reflections of these critically important collaborators.”
CERA awards are granted annually to faculty conducting work in the fields of research, community engagement, scholarly teaching, and student retention, learning and graduation.