Community Engagement Core

Howard University, Washington DC

Investigators

Linked publications, trials & patents

Abstract

ABSTRACT The overarching goal of the HU RCMI Community Engagement Core (CEC) is to assure that research translates into reduction, and eventual elimination, of health disparities. To achieve this goal, community academic partnerships must be designed for sustained effort that promotes integration between research, practice, and policy. To achieve this goal, the CEC will continue to work with our two community co-leaders, our 7-member community advisory board, and our network of more than 25 community-based organizations to engage communities in the DC metropolitan area in impactful partnerships. The CEC will work with an established university-wide community engagement committee to enhance community input into the university’s strategic objectives. CEC will continue to provide leadership to coordinate efforts with other community engagement programs within the HU health sciences schools (medicine, pharmacy, dentistry, nursing, allied health, public health). The coordinated efforts will enhance capacities for research recruitment, communications, and public engagement. CEC will work with the Investigator Development Core to promote research that focuses on the priority health topics, including factors that have been identified by our community advisory board. We will also partner with the HU RCMI Faculty Development program to provide faculty training in community engagement and communicating science to the public. To continue to support community engagement across the continuum of research, we facilitate connections between community partners and Howard researchers and provide consultation and coaching to new community-academic research teams. We will grow our group of 28 Community Health Workers (CHWs) who have received our “Research 101” training to 60 CHWs. We will engage at least 20 of those individuals as Community Research Associates (CRAs). The CRAs will have knowledge and self-efficacy to speak on research topics with their communities. We will continue to promote dissemination of research results to communities through virtual events where community members and scientists can learn from each other. We will also expand engagement through social and traditional media. To strategically translate findings into sustainable changes for communities, we will develop action teams to outline feasible pathways to promote advancement, dissemination, translation, and uptake of research results, as appropriate for the state-of-the science. These activities are expected to work synergistically to produce measurable and meaningful outcomes that favorably impact the historically intractable health disparities in the District of Columbia.