What Doesn't Kill You, Makes You Stronger: Connecting Challenges and Outcomes of Research-Practice Partnerships

• In Event: 45.051 - Building Knowledge About Research-Practice Partnerships

Abstract

This paper seeks to understand relationships between the common challenges that research-practice partnerships (RPPs) face and the relational/foundational outcomes they pursue. Drawing on Henrick et al.’s (2017) framework for assessing the effectiveness of RPPs, we analyze survey and interview data from a larger study of 27 IES-funded RPPs. Our findings indicate that partnerships that experienced turnover, timeline asynchronicities, and not having the right decision-makers at the table made more growth on outcomes related to relational/foundational practices than RPPs that only experienced one of these challenges. Additionally, RPP members who experienced all three challenges were more likely to name relational/foundational characteristics when describing markers of successful partnerships.

Authors

• Melia E Repko-Erwin, University of Colorado - Boulder

• Mary Quantz, University of Colorado - Boulder

• Caitlin Farrell, University of Colorado - Boulder

• Kristen L. Davidson, University of Colorado - Boulder

• William R. Penuel, University of Colorado - Boulder