AAACE 2021 Annual Conference

community-engaged scholarship, research design

In this session, I will share my experience using the framework of community-engaged scholarship (CES) with a community-based organization in a recent research study. I will describe the general steps involved in planning and implementing a CES study and highlight the challenges and successes of my experience.   

While the framework of community-engaged scholarship (CES) seems to align perfectly with the social justice arm of adult education, it is relatively underutilized by adult education researchers (Bracken,2005; Sandmann, 2007). This session is designed to inform attendees of the relevance of CES to adult education research and to guide incorporation of that framework into their research.
The study which served as the basis for this session was a product of the presenter’s participation in the Engagement, Outreach, and Scholarship Academy at her university. The research study was a collaboration with a local community partner to examine the lived experiences of a multi-generational sample of Latinos related to their social, economic, and linguistic integration in a “new gateway” state. The presenter used the principles of CES throughout the planning, implementation, and analysis stages of the study. While there were many challenges at various stages, the presenter found that this collaborative process added much greater depth and relevance to the study’s findings. In short, her experience with community-engaged scholarship can serve as an example to others interested in equity-based and meaningful research. It is hoped that this session will encourage fellow adult education researchers to engage in community-engaged scholarship.