Little Help from My Peers: Community-Based Organizations Mentoring Each Other in Building Organizational Capacity for CBPR

Community-based participatory research (CBPR) partnerships seek to develop equitable relationships that balance power and include partner participation in all phases of research. The Alliance for Research in Chicagoland Communities (ARCC) mission is to grow equitable and collaborative partnerships between Chicago-area communities and Northwestern for research that leads to measureable improvement in community health. Eleven University community and faith-based organizations (CBOs) serving on the ARCC Steering Committee are leading a project funded by two local foundation grants that aims to build and institutionalize CBO capacity as equal partners in research. This project recognizes that the paradigm shift to equitable research partnerships requires dedicated and skilled community partners able to confront engrained academic institutional culture and policies and barriers within communities. In Phase 1, the ARCC CBOs focused on building their own organizational and individual capacity. In Phase 2, they worked across their diverse organizations (diverse ethnic/racial, lifestage, and geographic communities, as well as diverse structures: coalition, direct service, advocacy) to synthesize lessons learned from their own experiences and created and refined tools based on these learnings. The project used a competitive call to accept a new cohort of 6 CBOs. Over a year, the ARCC CBOs peer mentored and facilitated learning for these CBOS through a series of workshops, one-on-one mentoring sessions, and technical assistance. CBOs from both cohorts will share key findings about building organizational capacity for CBPR in CBOs, as well as interest in creating a co-learning community and network of CBOs that can continue to support each other.