Angela Hart

Developing local ‘communities of practice’ through local community – university partnerships

This paper draws on the experiences of local community – university partnership activity in a UK university to offer a pragmatic framework for local community – university partnerships. We illustrate how to make things happen in this complex area and highlight our application of Wenger and Synder’s framework of ‘community of practice’ to our community – university partnership work. Our framework is rooted in a sense of place and a commitment to engage with issues of locality. It offers critical reflection on work in progress—projects within one programme, at the University of Brighton which is located in an ostensibly prosperous region of the UK, but where there are also areas of deep-seated disadvantage and economic and social exclusion. We illustrate some of the complex debates about how local partnerships can be conceived and developed; about what they mean for the definition of the university, and about how to work across academia and practice in a meaningful and inclusive way, while producing the desired outcomes. Over the past decade much has been done to grapple with the question of how best to cohere community – university relationships. Universities have almost always engaged with external professional worlds, for example through students on practice placement. However, formal strategic programmes increasingly feature, with various models of practice embedded within them. One model sees universities explicitly linking with local community, statutory and voluntary organisations, and with local social enterprises. In this model, universities may feel a sense of enhanced obligation to their local communities, possibly to mend previously poor relations. The work of the University of Pennsylvania is an example of current practice here (Maurrasse, 2001). Others place their primary emphasis on students and faculty members developing learning and research in a manner that enhances civic responsibility and engagement. Such models do not privilege local relations, and partnership work may be nationally or internationally orientated. Tufts University in Boston is a relevant example of this model.

Uniting Resilience Research and Practice With an Inequalities Approach

The concept of resilience has evolved, from an individual-level characteristic to a wider ecological notion that takes into account broader person–environment interactions, generating an increased interest in health and well-being research, practice and policy. At the same time, the research and policy-based attempts to build resilience are increasingly under attack for responsibilizing individuals and maintaining, rather than challenging, the inequitable structure of society. When adversities faced by children and young people result from embedded inequality and social disadvantage, resilience-based knowledge has the potential to influence the wider adversity context. Therefore, it is vital that conceptualizations of resilience encompass this potential for marginalized people to challenge and transform aspects of their adversity, without holding them responsible for the barriers they face. This article outlines and provides examples from an approach that we are taking in our research and practice, which we have called Boingboing resilience. We argue that it is possible to bring resilience research and practice together with a social justice approach, giving equal and simultaneous attention to individuals and to the wider system. To achieve this goal, we suggest future research should have a co-produced and inclusive research design that overcomes the dilemma of agency and responsibility, contains a socially transformative element, and has the potential to empower children, young people, and families.

Resilient moves: Tinkering with practice theory to generate new ways of thinking about using resilience

Recent public health policies have re-endorsed the key role all health and social care professionals have in tackling the social determinants of health inequalities. With inequalities firmly entrenched, and much theorising focused on reproduction rather than transformation, sustaining practitioner commitment and engagement with this work and maintaining confidence in achieving change is challenging. One increasingly popular way to intervene in practice to begin to address inequalities has been the use of resilience, even though resilience is frequently critiqued for its collusion with neoliberal imperatives in favouring individualised rather than socio-political responses. This article examines these concerns through the use of the practice turn and specifically ‘slim-line’ practice theory and ‘tinkering’ to explore the potential for reframing resilience theory and practice. Using an original data set derived from evaluations of resilience-based programmes, held with parents and practitioners between 2008 and 2012, this article re-examines participants’ understandings of resilience. We show how practice theory reveals entangled and emergent meanings, competencies and materials that constitute resilience as a social practice comprised of resilient moves. The implications of this reframing are discussed in relation to ontology, agency and change; but also for resilience theory and practice and public health practices more generally. In conclusion, we argue practice theory’s attention to context as more than mere backdrop to action helps shift inequality theorising beyond the individual and reproduction towards deeper, detailed social understandings of transformation and change.

Building resilience through group visual arts activities: Findings from a scoping study with young people who experience mental health complexities and/or learning difficulties

Summary This article reports research that aimed to identify and evaluate potential resilience benefits of visual arts interventions for young people with complex needs. The study involved a review of the ‘arts for resilience’ literature and a case study of 10 weekly resilience-building arts workshops for 10 young people experiencing mental health complexities and/or learning difficulties. Findings We found a significant existing evidence-base linking visual arts practice to individual and community resilience, across disciplinary fields including art therapy, social work, community health, visual arts practice and geographies of health. Visual art activities were utilised to both educate young people about resilience and enhance young people’s overall resilience. Qualitative research material developed from the case study shows that even short-term visual arts interventions can impact on young people’s resilience – crucially, participation was extremely beneficial to young people’s sense of belonging and ability to cope with difficult feelings (topics which arose repeatedly during interview, focus group discussion and observation). Applications Our review and findings from this small case study provide some initial insights into the resilience benefits of participation in visual arts activities. This, combined with the resilience-based practice framework presented here, could aid the effective targeting of interventions for social workers and others working with young people with complex needs. Alongside this research paper, an arts for resilience practice guide has been produced by the project team (including young people). It contains instructions on how to conduct a range of practical visual arts activities that we identified as being resilience-promoting.

Return-to-work support for employees with mental health problems: Identifying and responding to key challenges of sick leave

Introduction This research explored return-to-work and sick leave experiences of workers with mental health issues in contact with acute or community mental health services. Method Using a critical realist methodology with a comparative case study and collaborative design, 21 employed participants recovering from mental health problems participated in semi-structured interviews. Data were analysed using inductive and deductive thematic and constant comparative analysis. Findings While on sick leave, despite a range of challenges, participants treasured their work identities. They were sustained by positive and troubled by negative memories of work. People missed the routine of work and felt isolated. To varying degrees of success, they searched for alternative activities to fill this gap and promote recovery. Conclusion The need for sick leave was not disputed, but an important discovery was its iatrogenic (‘side-’) effects, whereby isolation and reduced activity levels could exacerbate mental health problems. Negative impacts of sick leave need to be mitigated by support to maintain worker identity and orientation and by opportunities and encouragement to sustain routine, activities and social contacts. A new concept of ‘occupational capital’ emerged, comprising accessible external opportunities and supports for occupational participation, and internal capacities and skills required to access these.

Challenging Inequalities Through Community–University Partnerships

One of the great challenges for effective relationships operating between universities and communities is in identifying where the common interest for a partnership may lie. It is possible to explore that question in the abstract, and list how particular universities and excluded communities may be able to work together. But we have a concern with that approach, that it is deeply impersonal. If you are talking about relationships, then relationships are fundamentally among people. Those people may wish to accomplish strategic goals of institutions with which they are involved, and the wider strategic environment does shape the ways those relationships evolve. But we find a real risk in overly academic approaches to understanding community engagement which fails to adequately reflect the people behind the engagement. This chapter seeks to understand the delicate ecology of relationships looking at a five-year community–university partnership focused on improving outcomes for disadvantaged children and their families.

Collaboration in the design and delivery of a mental health recovery college course: experiences of students and tutors

Abstract Background: Recovery Colleges address mental health challenges using an educative approach underpinned by a collaborative recovery orientated philosophy. Research has been limited with no studies identified reporting research on the design and delivery of a specific course. Aims: To understand how Recovery College students and tutors experience the design and delivery of a mental health Recovery College course, specifically the “‘Building Resilience” course. Method: Thematic analysis of qualitative data related to the experience and process of collaboration in recovery college course design and delivery. Data included 13 qualitative individual interviews with course students and tutors and “naturally occurring” data generated through course preparation and delivery. Results: Findings drew attention to the centrality of: prior experience and design related to students, tutors and the course structure; co-delivery related to tutors and co-learner impacts; and to the course methods and environment. Conclusions: Commitment to collaboration in design and delivery of Recovery College courses can mobilise the diverse experiences and expertise of tutors and students. The environment and methods of learning have a significant impact and should be considered alongside content. Boundaries between people and areas of knowledge and experience that arise can be viewed as sources of creativity that can enrich courses.

Building inclusion and resilience in students with and without SEN through the implementation of narrative speech, role play and creative writing in the mainstream classroom of primary education

ABSTRACT Based on the theory of inclusion, the present 3-year pilot program (2013–2016) deals with narrative speech, role play and creative writing as a useful tool to build resilience in primary school students with and without Special Educational Needs (SEN) in the mainstream classroom. The specific aim of the program was to help students develop a series of fundamental psychosocial skills, such as a positive sense of inner self and the ability to cooperate and relate to others by familiarising with them in recognising and expressing the basic emotions of joy, sadness, fear and anger. Under the systematic cooperation among the general education teacher, the special education teacher and the rest of the teaching staff, the concept was to involve the maximum of the school teachers in order to create a Community of Practice, Collaboration, Sharing Learning and Action. Using an action-based research approach, the data from the present work allowed the participating students to demonstrate a range of socio-emotional skills, including those necessary for self-awareness. Similarly, the teachers involved in the project in each class built positive relations with their students and the rest of the teachers as well, whom they encouraged to participate in various collaborative tasks through similar programs.

Communities of practice in community-university engagement: Supporting co-productive resilience research & practice

For the last 10 years, we have been exploring Communities of Practice (CoPs) as both a conceptual and practical approach to community-university engagement, most notably in our work on resilience with children, young people and families. We have found elements of CoP theory and practice to be a powerful and pragmatic way to approach many of the tensions, considerations and nuances of this work. This chapter focuses on our experiences (academics and community partners) of running a CoP with a diverse membership that meets monthly to discuss, disagree and debate about resilience research and practice. We outline those theoretical areas we have found invaluable in getting us started with CoPs, but we also discuss where we have found ourselves needing to develop our own approaches to help us with the complex circumstances and systems, rather than within one single domain. We identify a series of paradoxes that we have to navigate in making our CoP work—particularly the tensions between being social but intentional in our practice, and how we can disentangle the blend of participation and learning that occurs in our CoP space. We conclude by turning to the future, to consider the conceptual development that might be helpful in this area and to reflect on the potential of supporting co-productive research and practice in pursuing social goals through communities of practice.

Boundaries and Boundary Objects: An Evaluation Framework for Mixed Methods Research

While mixed methods research is increasingly established as a methodological approach, researchers still struggle with boundaries arising from commitments to different methods and paradigms, and from attention to social justice. Combining two lines of work—social learning theory and the Imagine Program at the University of Brighton—we present an evaluation framework that was used to integrate the perspectives of multiple stakeholders in the program’s social interventions. We explore how this “value-creation framework” acts as a boundary object across “boundaries of practice,” specifically across quantitative and qualitative methods, philosophical paradigms, and participant perspectives. We argue that the framework’s focus on cycles of value creation provided the Imagine Program with a shared language for negotiating interpretation and action across those boundaries.