Consultation as a Powerful Tool in Community–University Partnerships: Introduction to the Special Issue

ABSTRACT

This article introduces the special topic issue “Educational and Psychological Consultation within Community–University Partnerships.” The special issue provides a forum for scholars and readers to consider consultation as a powerful and practical tool that can be used in community–university partnerships (CUPs). In this article, we will introduce the concept of CUPs and situate them in the broader movement toward universities engaging communities for mutual benefit and the common good. Then, we will preview the collection of articles found in this special issue. Together, the contributions of these scholars provide concrete examples and conceptual models that other faculty can use in their own practice as scholars, educators, and citizens.

Over the last three decades, there has been an increasing movement toward the realignment of higher education to its historic role in and commitment to the public good (Campus Compact, 2017). This move toward community engagement has occurred at universities and colleges, both public and private, across the United States (Yamamura & Koth, 2018; Yates & Accardi, 2019). One way this engagement is taking shape is through long-term partnerships between university members and community organizations, which may be the most promising and mutually beneficial way forward (Hogan, Tynan, Covill, Kilmer, & Cook, 2017; Yates & Accardi, 2019). Community–university partnerships (CUPs) are defined as “collaborations between community organizations and institutions of higher learning for the purpose of achieving an identified social change goal … that ensures mutual benefit for the community organization and participating students” (Curwood, Munger, Mithcell, Mackeigan, & Farrar, 2011, p. 16). The university side of the partnership can include faculty, undergraduate, and graduate students, academic program, or even entire colleges. The community side of these partnerships can include local schools, nonprofit agencies, neighborhood associations, or other civic groups.

While there is growing recognition of the importance of community engagement and CUPs described above, it is not always clear how individual faculty members or academic programs can partner with communities from their roles at the university. What are the assets that reside within the university that, when combined with the assets of the community lead to mutually beneficial outcomes for people and for the organization who serve them? Out of the many collaborative approaches that can be applied in CUPs, we assert that educational and psychological consultation offers a powerful set of tools that can be wielded to enact positive changes in the community and within universities. Given the need for school systems and nonprofit organizations to continually do more with diminishing resources (Hogan et al., 2017), university members can employ their consultation skills with community partners to meet mutually beneficial aims.

For this special theme issue, and in keeping with the scope of the journal, we embrace a broad definition of consultation as “a process that facilitates problem-solving for individuals, groups, and organizations,” (Journal of Educational and Psychological Consultation, n.d.). Consultation provides a robust avenue and framework for faculty to facilitate problem-solving in the community and collaborate on accomplishing community goals and aims. In addition, consultation can be a way to create and sustain partnerships that can bring about synergy between universities and communities. These partnerships can serve to break the isolation and elitism of the ivory tower through harnessing and valuing the strengths of all involved, including faculty, students, and communities. Moreover, when students are meaningfully involved in the consultation, these community-embedded learning experiences can serve as important touchstones in their professional and ethical formation. In this way, a university’s goals and aims related to providing students with a lasting education are met. But what about the aims of the university and of faculty to produce relevant research scholarship?

Introducing the special topic issue

This volume provides readers access to a forum among scholars who share their community-engaged work through consultation, including: applying existing consultation models, developing new consultation models, highlighting issues in developing and maintaining consultation partnerships, and demonstrating ways to get students involved and developing consultation skills. Two articles in this issue applied participatory culture-specific models of consultation and intervention development with community agencies serving youth. Harper and colleagues applied the model to improve a positive youth development program for African American adolescent girls. Wang used the approach to identify challenges and solutions for Asian American immigrant families, helping to fill a gap identified in the multicultural consultation literature by collecting and disseminating information about Asian American adolescents. Both articles emphasize the importance of establishing trusting relationships before engaging in professional partnerships.

Two articles described large-scale partnerships that leveraged consultation to make systems change. Raia-Hawrylak and colleagues highlighted processes and key competencies for consultants working within a state-sponsored partnership providing long-term support to school leadership teams committed to improving school culture. Pearrow, along with collaborators from Boston Public Schools and Boston Children’s Hospital, described the consultative partnership between their institutions to share resources and mutually support shared goals in student behavioral health.

Whitcomb and colleagues summarized an ongoing, multi-year partnership between their university and local schools to provide professional development for school staff and to develop competence in consultation with school psychology graduate students. In their article on implementation fidelity and ecological consultation, Moy and Lee extend tenets of school consultation to a school-based mentoring program housed within a university’s place-based initiative.

In a thought-provoking conceptual article, Ng and Martinez identified faculty as the “missing link” in CUPs and draw attention to the dilemmas facing faculty who initiate and maintain these partnerships. These authors bring attention to one of the primary critiques of community-engaged teaching, learning, and scholarship, which is that these practices lack “rigor.” When one begins to understand these practices; however, it becomes clears that these practices reflect rigor in the real world, with all its lived complexities.

Conclusion

This special issue came into being to provide a forum for scholars to share their important and impactful work occurring in the context of community–university partnerships (CUPs). It is our hope that this special issue will have the impact of unleashing creativity in consultation work while inspiring more university members to engaged in CUPs. This will continually draw higher education to its original aim of benefiting the public good.

We would like to thank the many scholars who contributed work to this special issue and for their commitment and passion to CUPs. In addition, we would like to thank the invited blind reviewers for their insightful suggestions. Finally, we would like thank Dr David Shriberg for his guidance and mentoring that made this special issue possible.

Disclosure statement

We have no known conflicts of interest to disclose.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Kristi A. Lee

Kristi A. Lee, Ph.D., LMHCA, NCC is an Associate Professor of Clinical Mental Health Counseling at Seattle University where she serves as the Director of the Academic Service-Learning Faculty Fellows Program. In collaboration with students and community partners, her master's level human development course has completed over seventy projects for community organizations. Dr. Lee's conducts research on service-learning, as well as collaborative research on gender-based violence in Guatemala, and research on the ripple effect of hate crimes with the city of Seattle.

Greg E. Moy

Greg E. Moy, Ph.D. is an Assistant Professor in School Psychology at Seattle University. Dr. Moy serves as a faculty consultant to the Seattle University Youth Initiative and serves on the editorial board of the Journal of Educational and Psychological Consultation. Dr. Moy teaches courses on applied educational psychology, educational assessment, and ethics and law for school psychologists. Notable publications include a book chapter on social justice advocacy in school psychology practice, and articles related to: social justice in school psychology graduate education, family-school collaboration, and distance learning in school psychology. Current scholarly projects are focused on school-based social-emotional learning programs and academic youth mentoring programs.