Supporting Social Innovation through Community-University Partnerships

Nov 23, 2011

!  These partnerships have been sustained over a significant time period !

!  Strong examples of achieving social impact, as well as organizational/institutional change !

!  Partners obviously think and act in quite unique ways - “rule-breakers” !

Multiple inner city organizations and UBC’s Learning Exchange

Multiple, cross-sector partners and Lakehead U’s Food Security Research Network –

First Nations community around Fort Albany and U Waterloo’s Department of Environment Resource Studies

Université de la Rue / Écol-Hôtel / and other community initiatives with U Québec à Trois Riviéres

City of Guelph / McNeil Pharmaceuticals / and other community initiatives with U Guelph’s Research Shop

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!

….is an initiative, product, process or program that profoundly changes

! the basic routines, ! resource flows, ! authority flows or ! beliefs of any social system.

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!  Awareness of processes of emergence in a system !  The jazz metaphor describes this comprehensive

approach - improvisation and listening are key !  Sensitivity, humility, ‘tuning-in’ to system helps include

multiple perspectives, work with emergence !  Enables emphasis on high-leverage areas !  Letting go of control and fixed agendas

“The First Nations in the North and down here, I generally don’t have to explain systems to them. They have a really clear sense of how political, social, ecological, historical systems interrelate. It

is sort of intuitive.”

“This strategy’s intentional focus on emergence and

complexity demands that we facilitate interactions

amongst many diverse groups of people. The big challenge for most is to

resist the urge to control.

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!  Follow the passion in people – use this !  Invest in relationships over time !  Appropriate pace and sequence !  Invite trust and connection

“When you bring together enough people who are open to their

passion, something will happen.”

“…we held our meetings after 8pm, and we went to their

living rooms because that is where they like to meet; we

established this “inside-ness” but we didn’t set the agenda or the timing, we just let it

emerge.”

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!  Requires strong willingness to question assumptions & habits, remain open, humble

!  Basic deconstruction of positional/financial power is necessary, but implicit or foundational – it doesn’t lead

“So if there is that obvious sense of

disparity and inequality between people’s

circumstances, how do we relate to that? This is

simply an important starting point for me.”

“We work with community

organizations who feel they are powerful and who act positively.”

!

!  Power is not a zero-sum game – new power is an emergent quality of effective community-university collaborations

“It’s the emergent power of working collaboratively: how do

we mobilize it? How do we generate it? Not approaching it as, what power does someone have because they have a PhD and a higher salary? Let’s not

waste our time on that.”

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!  One or more individuals who are trusted authorities in multiple contexts – community, classroom, university

!  Harness or weave energies towards collaborative action

!  Accessible, informal mentors !  Blend personal and professional - passion,

values, purpose “[She] recognizes the complexity

and concentrates on the dynamics, the relationships between the

different parts and people involved in our work. She and her team

build connections between different cultures, all of which she

understands and honours.”

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!  Intentional development of “third spaces”, “hybrid spaces”, “insideness”, “we-ness”

!  Institutional and personal relationships both important

!  Passion, purpose, fun, and energy are hallmarks !  NOT bureaucratic – direct, messy relationships

We have to get faculty members, students, staff, going to the community, and people from

community coming to the university to lead reflection

sessions, giving presentations… we need people from each space to infect the space of the other.

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!  Work comes from a sense of calling, service, connection

!  Requires self-change, humility, transformation !  Motivation from deep, collective values !  Can bring up strong resistance/fear

“These partnerships can allow the idea that you no longer see yourself as so

separate. The ego structure bumps up against these

collaborative approaches – no one talks about that

very much.”

“They are doing the work because it

has to be done, for their children’s

children.”

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! New ways of knowing and learning are fostered in community organizations, among community members and within university participants ! Connected to larger paradigm shift in academia and in the social sector ! Breaking down old institutions of knowledge, opening up new avenues for solving problems

“We are currently operating in a period of global transition

between two world views - an old one and a new one that is

non-linear, non-mechanistic, and interconnected.…We’re like a termite group that’s chewing away at the old structures.”

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!  Central Catalyzers: initiators, weavers, boundary-spanners, institutional entrepreneurs!

!  Gatekeepers: release resources and support!

!  Practitioners: academic and community-based !

!  Students: bring enthusiasm, authenticity !

!  Observers: internal or external, offer encouragement and/or recognition!

!  Investors: financially support and therefore guide development, implementation and evaluation

!

“Ideally the creation of these hybrid spaces between the university and community happens because people from both sides realize that it is way more fun, and ultimately powerful, to work with each other than it is not to! !

I really truly believe if we can bring these two forms of knowledge together, we can solve some of the problems in the world, we can understand and do things di"erently. Part of the reason that these problems seem intractable and complex is that these two domains of knowledge have not been e"ectively married.”

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!  To ensure necessary TIME (to see the system, to assess readiness, to develop relationships, etc): implicitly ask for time from funders – point to outstanding examples, highlighting TIME taken to create foundations for sustainability and impact !

!  To attune to POWER in a productive manner: intentionally engage with individuals passionate about change on an issue, and work to focus on the emergent power that comes with collaboration; do NOT waste time convincing uninterested parties to participate

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!  To create conditions for PARTNERSHIPS: identify a ‘central catalyst’ to move across the system, internally and externally; must be individual(s) with established trust in multiple places, with access to those who hold resources, with capacity for keeping the big picture in sight (system sight), values-driven, purposeful, strategic and engaging!

!  To enliven relationships: reduce the distance between key actors; for example, encourage faculty members to join the Board of Directors of organizations with whom they partner.

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!  How can we more fully describe the ‘hybrid space’ or ‘insideness’ that supports these partnerships?

!  What skills and competencies do central catalyzers have? How to cultivate these? Can they be trained?

!  Is it possible to institutionalize this work without diluting it to where the power and potential is lost?

!  What does it take to keep these highly interpersonal, values-driven partnerships alive beyond the originators?

!  How much does language limit our attempts to describe these partnerships and patterns? How can we best tell these stories?