This section investigates
a wide range of community supports for children, families, and people
of all ages and backgrounds.
It includes research
and information on community institutions, such as schools, clinics,
libraries, parks, faith-based organizations, cultural and civic centers,
and other places for human and social interaction. Safe neighborhoods,
good jobs, affordable housing, accessible public services, family-friendly
workplaces, quality education,and opportunities for civic engagement
are important dimensions of healthy communities.
University of Minnesota’s
Relocation Assistance Program
The Relocation Assistance Program provides information about such
topics as housing, transportation, child and elder care, school systems,
resources for women and people of color, and other community services
throughout Minnesota. RAP is part of the Center for Human Resource
Development in the Office of Human Resources. Year round, it strives
to be a warm and welcoming place for those who are relocating to the
Twin Cities.
Family-Centered
Community Building: Bibliography
Bibliography developed
with the assistance of the University of Minnesota’s Children,
Youth and Family Consortium and other organizations engaged in Family
Re-Union, a national policy initiative led by former Vice President
Al Gore.
Institute
on Community Integration
The Institute
on Community Integration (ICI) seeks to improve community supports
for individuals with developmental and other disabilities, and their
families, through research, professional training, technical assistance,
and publications. ICI’s four program areas are early childhood,
school-age children, transition services, and community living. It
produces resource guides for families, schools and communities on
issues that range from inclusive education to parent and community
teams for school success.
Community
Partnership with Families (PDF)
Department of
Family Social Science Professor William Doherty conducts research
and outreach on community participation models for family professionals.
In this article, he develops a model that extends the role of the
family professional beyond that of service provider to one of a citizen
working with other citizens to produce collective work that is of
public value.
Just
in Time Research: Resilient Community
This publication
includes policy research and recommendations for citizens and policymakers
related to issues that are critical to the resilience and vitality
of Minnesota communities.
Minnesota
Center for Community Legal Education
The Minnesota
Center for Community Legal Education promotes the development of civic
learning through citizenship and law-related programs for youth in
schools and community organizations. Through education of teachers
and community resource people, curriculum development and a lending
library, technical assistance and youth programs, the Center helps
foster effective and responsible citizens.
Neighborhood
Planning for Community Revitalization (NPCR)
NPCR builds partnerships
between community-based organizations and local colleges and Universities
in the Twin Cities. Community groups can apply to receive the support
of a student who can assist in neighborhood research projects that
range from economic development to health surveys, and from environmental
audits to the establishment of childcare centers. Their on-line
library contains over 140 reports on neighborhood projects and
applied research completed by students and faculty.
The
Center for Democracy and Citizenship
The Center for Democracy
and Citizenship conducts workshops and offers programs on
civic action for schools, communities and groups and individuals
interested in active citizenship. Its programs include Public
Achievement, a youth civic education initiative, and the Jane
Addams School of Democracy, community learning center on the
West Side of St. Paul.
Neighborhood Learning Community
(PDF)
A community-university
partnership led by The Center for Democracy and Citizenship
is featured in the Winter/Spring 2002 issue of the Research
Review, a publication of UM Office for Research, and reprinted
here with the editor's permission. A Parents and Communities
for Kids grant from the Wallace Reader's Digest Fund is developing
community leadership and improving learning for children and
adults in this diverse, urban neighborhood.
The
Center for Child and Family Health Promotion Research (CCFHPR)
Located
within the University of Minnesota's School of Nursing, the
Center for Child and Family Health Promotion Research develops
and disseminates community-based interventions that seek to
improve the lives of children and families. Research topics
range from home visiting programs to community-wide violence
prevention, and from healthy births to youth development.
The
Center for Small Towns
The Center for
Small Towns provides opportunities for community-University partnerships
to strengthen the health and capacity of small towns in Minnesota.
Activities include applied research projects, leadership development,
strategic planning assistance, networking and mini grants.
Rural
Community Life
A list of publications
and practical guides for understanding rural Minnesota communities
and families, compiled as a partnership with the College of Human
Ecology, the Minnesota Extension Service, and the Minnesota Agricultural
Experiment Station.
Community-based
Parenting Programs
The University
of Minnesota Extension Service conducts research based programs that
foster effective parenting in Minnesota communities. This site provides
information links to more than ten long-standing programs, including
Positive Parenting, Dads Make a Difference, Parents Forever, Building
Family Strengths, Helping Youth Succeed: A Bicultural Parenting Guide
for Southeast Asian Families, and more.
Community
Vitality
Extension’s
Community Vitality programs focus on economic strength, civic empowerment,
technological literacy and social capital of Minnesota’s communities,
especially as they face rapidly changing dynamics in population demographics,
technological capacity, globalization and social change.
Institute
on Domestic Violence in the African American Community
The Institute works
to address domestic violence in the African American Community
through education and action. It publishes a newsletter, offers
public events, and provides consultation to local and national
organizations.
Institute
on race & Poverty Releases Report on Racial Disparities
and Metropolitan Regionalism (PDF)
The Institute on Race and
Poverty is a research center based at the University of
Minnesota Law School that promotes a better understanding
of the issues confronting communities that face the combined
challenges of racial segregation and poverty. The Institute
recognizes that many of the challenges facing neighborhoods
are the result of the increasing concentration of poor people
in communities that are racially, spatially, socially, and
economically isolated from mainstream America. The Institute
hosts meetings and publishes reports on issues in fair housing,
transportation, education, racial profiling, democratic processes,
and other topics. Click
here to read a new report on the problems that sprawl
and exclusionary policies create for communities of color
in metropolitan regions.
Minnesota
Center Against Violence and Abuse
Minnesota Center
Against Violence and Abuse supports education and research on violence-related
topics. Its database includes bibliographies, reports, trainings,
and links to many resources. Two projects of the Center include Making
the Link, which promotes the safety of battered women and children
exposed to domestic violence, and Child
Abuse Prevention Studies, which is an interdisciplinary, post-baccalaureate
certificate program that prepares professionals to work more effectively
with children, their families, and the institutions that serve them.
Partnership
to Address Violence through Education (PAVE)
PAVE was a community-university
initiative that created a unique violence prevention and intervention
training process for early childhood educators. The initiative ended
in 1996, but resources from the project are available on-line and
the Center for Early Education and Development (CEED) continues to
offer trainings and conferences based on PAVE principles and strategies.
Center
for Early Education and Development
The Center for
Early Education and Development (CEED) provides information regarding
young children (birth to age eight), including children with special
needs, in the areas of education, child care, child development, and
family education. It conducts training and outreach projects on a
variety of topics, and publishes newsletters, policy briefs and other
resources.
Leaving Schools Behind: When Students Drop Out
Leaving Schools Behind: When Students Drop Out
is a school-family partnership for children at risk of dropping out
of school. University researchers worked with colleagues in Minneapolis
Public Schools to develop this intervention program that connects
families, schools and community services, and keeps everyone informed
about the day to day needs of high risk students.
Directory
of Nonprofit Organizations of Color in Minnesota
This is an electronic
directory of not-for-profit associations, organizations, and mutual
assistance and fraternal groups of color in the state of Minnesota.
Organizations included in the directory are governed by people of
color and/or primarily serve one or more communities of color. The
directory includes religious organizations and tribal governments.
It does not include for-profit organizations or state offices.
Youth
and AIDS Project (YAP)
The University
of Minnesota Youth and AIDS Project (YAP) was founded in 1989, with
a mission to prevent transmission of HIV to high-risk youth and provide
care to youth and families living with HIV infection. Its programs
are grounded in the belief that HIV-related services for youth must
be developmentally appropriate, culturally competent, coordinated,
and family-centered in order to be effective. Services include prevention
and outreach programs, testing and counseling, a list of community
–based resources, and a confidential web tool that allows youth
and their families to seek advice on-line.
Evaluation
Studies Track in Educational Policy and Administration
The Evaluation
Studies track in educational policy and administration is a degree granting program that offers professional
development and training for decision makers in education, business
and social services. It presents an annual summer institute for professional
evaluators and program directors in non-profit and for-profit organizations.
The
Human Rights Resource Center
The Human Rights
Resource Center assists communities in building networks to promote
human rights, trains students and professionals as human rights educators,
and distributes electronic and print materials on human rights issues.
The Resource Center has been a partner with the Children, Youth &
Family Consortium in promoting awareness and conducting programs about
the U.N.
Convention on the Rights of the Child. See
CYFC’s winter 1999 newsletter on Children’s Human Rights.
