Community-Engaged Research

The University of California Public Engagement (UCPE) database stores information about activities administered by UC Davis that include, involve, or impact individuals, groups, and communities beyond the university. If you administer a publicly engaged program, project, internship, course, or partnership, please enter it in the database.

The Community Engagement program is a well-established resource linking investigators and community partners to implement the mission of building capacity and infrastructure for clinical and translational research among investigators, patients, health care providers, policymakers, and community-based organizations. The program leverages institutional centers and resources focused on community and stakeholder partnerships.

The Feminist Research Institute transforms research culture to create more accurate and impactful research across all disciplines by addressing historical bias and ongoing systemic oppression in research through trainings, community partnerships, and transdisciplinary projects, all built on inclusive practices. The result is research that moves us towards a restored environment and justice for all regardless of gender, race, ability, socioeconomic background, resources and shared experiences.

The Community Engagement Collaborative is a community of practice for university faculty and staff actively working with external communities with the purpose of growing UC Davis’ capacity as an institution committed to the public good.

Created by UCSF Clinical and Translational Science Institute (CTSI) and Center for Community Engagement, this online toolkit helps users understand community engaged research and introduces them to valuable resources.

Community Futures, Community Lore is an online resource dedicated to making culturally-rooted, youth participatory action research (YPAR) resources available for free. The resources on this site originated from the work of the Intercultural Oral History Project, Community LORE, Youth In Focus, the UC Davis Center for Regional Change Putting Youth on the Map program and many, many community collaborators.

Thriving Earth Exchange (TEX), powered by AGU, connects Earth and space scientists with community leaders and helps them work together on projects that use Earth and space science to advance community priorities. TEX has launched over 60 collaborative projects, giving them a view into the challenges of community science and some of the successful strategies that have been used to overcome those challenges. This resource summarizes what they have learned from those projects.

Bay Area Regional Health Inequities Initiative's new guide provides detailed recommendations for policymakers and practitioners on centering communities impacted by inequities—from project budgeting tips to no-wrong-door approaches for gathering community-driven solutions.

University of Minnesota has additional resources that offer guidance and support for navigating the many stages of university-community partnerships, including trainings, partnership checklists, memorandum of understanding and more.

The Public Scholar Conversation Cards were designed by Imagining America to spark conversation about the joy, contributions, and struggles of public artists, designers and scholars.

The Public Scholar Imagination Guide from Imagining America provides a variety of reflection and action tools for anyone trying to improve their own practice and for those interested in making the university a more hospitable, caring, and creative place to nurture public, engaged, and activist scholarship, art-making and design.

A scientists guide to successful collaboration.

The collaborative, action-oriented research we conduct and the community-led efforts we support are needed now more than ever, but how does one do this work as authentically, equitably and effectively as possible during a pandemic? To help answer this question and support our staff and others engaged in similar remote work with communities, the CRC’s Community Engagement team decided to compile the following resource guide.

A list of resources geared toward faculty and staff researchers.

Pivot is the most comprehensive database of funding opportunities available. Create your own saved searches and review dozens of subject-specific lists of opportunities hand-picked by Office of Research staff. Access is free and available to everyone with a Kerberos login.

The Pilot Projects Program helps researchers who are early-stage investigators in environmental health sciences, established investigators new to environmental health sciences, or established environmental health sciences investigators exploring substantially new research directions in a field relevant to environmental health sciences. All proposals to the EHSC Pilot Projects Program must include a plan for community engagement.

The Global Affairs Curriculum Enhancement Through Global Learning program, a faculty development opportunity that supports the university-wide Global Education for All initiative, will provide UC Davis faculty with concrete tools for globalizing teaching and preparing students for success in a globalized world.

This award is given annually to first-year, undergraduate and graduate students, and one registered student organization in recognition of dedicated service to others that is substantial in breadth, quality and time commitment. The service undertaken has resulted in a substantive and positive impact on the campus, local, national and international communities. The honorees have excelled in leadership and scholarship, improved the lives of others in innovative ways and demonstrated a commitment to equity and inclusion. The nomination process starts during winter quarter.

The goals of the fellowship program are to actively engage students in shaping the University’s climate action programs and supporting the University’s aggressive goals for reducing greenhouse gas emissions while creating a more equitable, sustainable, resilient and healthy world.

Recipients will receive $15,000 to implement a year-length, sustainable public service project. Up to $7,000 may be given to the recipient as a scholarship to cover educational expenses, with the remaining amount funding the service project expenses.

There are a variety of funding opportunities available to support global learning that include awards, fellowships, grants, scholarships, and funds to off-set or fully cover program costs. Some funding may be to support the work/learning of a certain type of program or only for students with specific interests/backgrounds. Other resources are more general and can be used across different types of global learning opportunities. Details and requirements change frequently so students are advised to contact the funding agency directly for more information.

Applications for research projects that examine questions of marginalization, promote social, racial and/or environmental justice, or engage community-based public scholarship are encouraged.

Scholars receive up to $30,000 for a graduate degree leading to employment in public service, along with leadership development, networking, and a Washington D.C. internship

The goals of the Imagining America/Joy of Giving Something Fellows Program are to elevate photography and digital media as pathways for undergraduate students to pursue their careers and to make a difference in their communities. The program specifically aims to support students for whom economic and family circumstances render such career pathways particularly challenging.

Publicly Active Graduate Education (PAGE) is Imagining America’s (IA) network for publicly engaged graduate students in humanities, arts, and design. Imagining America invites graduate students with a demonstrated interest and commitment in public scholarship ​and/or artistic practice to apply for the PAGE Fellowship. Awardees receive a year’s worth of mentorship, professional development training, and community support as well as a travel stipend to attend a Fellows Summit during the national conference.

The goal of the Bradshaw Scholars Program is to create opportunities for students to deepen their leadership, applied research, and communication skills through hands-on experiential learning. As Bradshaw Scholars, select UCD undergraduate and graduate students spend 6-10 hours per week during Winter and Spring quarters, working on applied and policy-oriented research projects with community partners and UCD faculty. Students receive mentoring and professional development and contribute to high-impact regional change projects.

UC Grad Slam is an annual contest in which master’s and Ph.D. students across UC campuses – in disciplines ranging from hard sciences to humanities – compete to sum up their research for a general audience. Students should present the significance and fundamental points of their work at UC Davis in a clear, direct, and interesting manner.

The UC Davis Library Graduate Student Prize celebrates graduate student researchers who use the library to create outstanding, publicly engaged scholarship. Up to three prizes will be awarded for an original, unpublished, written work created while the applicant is a graduate student at UC Davis. The $1,000 prize is co-sponsored by the UC Davis Library and the UC Davis Office of Public Scholarship and Engagement.