We work with community partners through all of our programs and special projects. Our work is rooted in community-engaged scholarship, and as such, our community partners identify projects and bring them to CESI. We then identify the right program within CESI to meet the needs of the community partner. Below is a brief description of each of the programs and how they work:
Community Engaged Teaching and Learning (CETL)
Community-engaged learning (CEL) courses can be a great option for community partners to work with students on community-focused research and other knowledge generating and sharing activities. Students conduct research that addresses community questions and results in products like:
- Academic and/or plain language research reports
- One-pagers and other short summaries of research findings
- Environmental scans of existing programs
- Infographics, videos, podcasts, digital storytelling, and other creative outputs
In addition to addressing community research questions, the data produced by student learning can also be used to strengthen grant applications, presentations, or appeals to support programs.
Learn more about working with the CETL program.
Guelph Lab
The Guelph Lab is a collaboration of The College of Social and Applied Human Sciences, University of Guelph and the City of Guelph. It is a social innovation lab where staff, researchers, students, and community members can explore organizational challenges and problems, test new ideas, and mobilize the insights of social science research to produce creative programs and policy.
Projects to date have addressed a range of issues including:
- Procurement
- The sharing economy
- Budgeting
Learn more about working with the Guelph Lab.
Knowledge Mobilization
Our Knowledge Mobilization program co-produces knowledge in collaboration with academics and community partners. Some of the ways the program works with partners includes:
- Skills development workshops
- Teaching
- Support for grant writing
- Brokering (facilitating connections between research partners)
- Communication
Learn more about working with the Knowledge Mobilization program.
Research Shop
The Research Shop works with local and regional organizations and collaborations to carry out high impact community-engaged scholarship. They often collaborate with the social services and non-profit sectors, however, the topics of research are diverse and reflect the needs of all our partners. Working in teams, Research Shop students, staff, and community partners review existing research, conduct community-engaged research, and mobilize knowledge.
Learn more about working with the Research Shop.
Special Projects and Events
CESI also undertakes a number of special projects and events that fall outside of our defined program areas. These projects and events are diverse in nature, and are developed in collaboration with community, faculty, staff and students.
Projects to date have focused on a range of topics, including:
- Community-engaged scholarship
- Community-engaged research
- Thematic project clusters
- Capacity building
Learn more about our Special Projects and Events.