Questioning the Impact of Impact: Evaluating Community-Campus Engagement as Contextual, Relational, and Process Based

Abstract

As community-campus engagement (CCE) continues to gain momentum, impact has increasingly been evaluated through qualitative measurements rooted in community-based perspectives. However, for CCE to have meaningful impact, it must challenge dominant power structures and work to create equitable relationships. This article explores efforts to better understand and evaluate the impacts of CCE. Based in our research on 12 place-based CCE projects that aimed to support food sovereignty in Canada, the findings highlight how evaluating impact needs to be contextual, relational, and process-based with a focus on how CCE contributes to or hinders broader social change. Two additional themes supporting increased impact also emerged: the development of collaborative knowledge and actions; and, building networks of CCE communities of practice. The research also identified the limitations of evaluating CCE impact when measurements are predetermined , top down, and are not rooted in community needs and perspectives. While we believe that evaluating impact can be a meaningful and important process, it is necessary to challenge assumptions that measuring impact is always desirable or possible.

Building Action Research Partnerships for Community Impact: Lessons From a National Community-Campus Engagement Project

“…Beyond conferences and meetings, Hub co-leads, research assistants and partners also worked collectively to analyze and document successful CCE principles and practices with food movements. These learnings have been reflected upon, debated, and shared through academic papers, book chapters, webinars, and conference presentations (for example, see Andrée et al, 2016;Levkoe et al, 2016;Kepkiewicz et al, 2017;Kepkiewicz et al, 2018;Levkoe et al, 2019aLevkoe et al, ' 2019bLevkoe and Kepkiewicz, 2020). Together, all these activities have promoted a genuine recognition that knowledge generated in community and academic circles has a different but equal value.…”

“It Really Put a Change on Me”: Visualizing (Dis)connections within a Photovoice Project in Peterborough/Nogojiwanong, Ontario

“…Participatory techniques already have the potential to be relational, requiring cooperation and diverse stakeholders to work together, who significantly benefit from existing social networks (Janzen et al 2016;Kemmis and McTaggart 2005). Levkoe and Kepkiewicz (2020) performed a pan-Canadian evaluation of 12 community engagement initiatives and concluded that after participatory research projects, partners perceived other partnering organizations as better colleagues and friends working towards a common goal and agreed that the process broadened networks, leading to future collaborative works.…”

“…However, relationships and connections are difficult to anticipate, explain, and evaluate, which can come at direct odds with the bias among funding agencies' criteria to evaluate investments by citing measurable, observable, and quantifiable change, which is equated to impact in final reports. (Hardy et al 2018;Levkoe and Kepkiewicz 2020). Hardy et al's (2018) case study of Hermosas Vidas is unique in that it seeks to quantify the number of 'lasting' relationships built through the participatory health research project.…”

Modularity in Intersectoral Research/Action Collaborations for Food Systems Transformation: Lessons from the FLEdGE Community-Engaged Network

“…The value and impact of research collaborations cannot be quantified in a straightforward way (Beckman et al, 2011;Greenhalgh et al, 2016;Levkoe & Kepkiewicz, 2020).…”

“…Through the Community First, Impacts of Community Engagement (CFICE) partnership project, partners working on food sovereignty projects described the establishment of a community of practice that contributed to research, teaching, and action. Levkoe and Kepkiewicz (2020) explain:…”