What are partnerships?
How are partnerships established at Buffalo State?
How is a partnership defined on this campus?
How does a collaborative relationship help to make us distinctive?
What kinds of partnerships exist on this campus?
What is the relationship of partnerships to scholarly activity?
What assistance is available for faculty and student involvement in partnerships?
Is there a difference between outreach, public engagement, community engagement and partnerships?
What are the incentives for collaboration?
What are partnerships?
A partnership is a relationship involving close cooperation between the college and the community. It is characterized by the presence of the following:
- A fit with the mission of the college specific goals and responsibilities among the various parties
- A delineated time frame (to include revisiting the partnership on periodic or ongoing basis)
- Ideally, a memorandum of understanding or letter of agreement/commitment
- An understanding that the relationship should be mutually beneficial
Partnerships are established for one or more of the following purposes:
- To provide a mechanism for collaboration of faculty,staff, and/or students, with the community, on shared interests and common themes
- To facilitate the preparation of funding requests to external entities
- To actively engage the college with the broader external community in the interest of mutual benefits
- To create a working relationship defined by mutually agreed upon goals and objectives that advance the welfare of the college, local neighborhoods, Western New York, and/or New York State
How is a partnership defined on this campus?
Partnerships provide opportunities to combine teaching, scholarship, and service in unique ways.
How does a collaborative relationship help to make us distinctive?
Our distinctiveness is in inquiry and action. We are an "action tank" combining theory with practice. Collaboration offers opportunities to demonstrate mutually beneficial problem solving with our partner.
What kinds of partnerships exist on this campus?
See the College Centers and Partnerships page for projects initiated by departments, by centers on campus, and by Service Learning.
What is the relationship of partnerships to scholarly activity?Partnerships provide opportunities to combine teaching, scholarship, and service in unique ways to develop innovative solutions in collaboration with the community. Partnerships can be innovative exploration of scholarly problem solving within a discipline. Application of various research methodologies can produce distinctive outcomes that are publishable and count toward promotion and tenure.
What assistance is available for faculty and student involvement in partnerships?
The Office of College and Community Partnerships helps to identify, showcase, and connect initiatives. Minigrant incentives will be available in spring 2007. Students can be involved through the faculty.
Is there a difference between outreach, public engagement, community engagement and partnerships?
The differences are minor. Higher education is challenged to re-examine its public purpose and its commitment, and to become engaged through actions and teaching with its communities. Colleges and universities are major repositories of knowledge, resources and labor that can be marshaled in service to communities, and to educate a new generation of active engaged citizens. This process also provides citizens with a means to find viable
solutions to problems and issues.
What are the incentives for collaboration?
Experience based community learning and problem solving can benefit faculty scholarship, promotion and tenure. Partnerships and civic engagement are not an added responsibility. They can enhance teaching and scholarship, rather than service. Collaboration may enhance
opportunities for external funding.
