The Institute for Policy and Governance (IPG) is restructuring its existing Community Voices, Trustees Without Borders, Community Change Journal and community-based research programs into one overarching initiative, which will now be called the Community Change Collaborative (CCC – does this acronym ring a bell?). While still an evolving concept, the CCC aims to unite theory and praxis through projects, research, education and forums focused on community engagement, change and development issues.
The Institute’s participation in the Vibrant Virginia initiative is closely aligned with its choice to rethink the organization of its community change efforts. Vibrant Virginia is a “a unique partnership between Virginia Tech’s Office of Outreach and International Affairs, Virginia Cooperative Extension, the College Access Collaborative, the School of Public and International Affairs (SPIA), and the Policy Strategic Growth Area (SGA)” aimed at connecting Virginia Tech researchers and development practitioners serving the Commonwealth (https://econdev.vt.edu/vibrantvirginia.html). The initiative highlights applied research, policy analysis, and community engagement projects.
Along with the Community Voices speaker series, the Trustees Without Borders podcasts, and the graduate student-managed Community Change Journal, the CCC will host a bi-monthly forum featuring the work and methods of a range of faculty and practitioners focused on community change. In addition, the CCC will focus on:
- tailoring research, facilitation, and workshops for community development efforts in partnering Virginia towns;
- conducting ethnographic field tours exploring ways of knowing places within Virginia and neighboring states; and
- sharing and reflecting on those experiences to inform future research, community projects, and the development of relevant interdisciplinary curricula.
The CCC will hold planning meetings monthly during the coming academic year; interested graduate students and faculty from any discipline are invited to collaborate on community development projects in Virginia, to explore theories, methods and approaches to community change, and to share lessons learned from past programs and experiences. For more information, please contact IPG Director, Dr. Max Stephenson, mstephen@vt.edu.
Award-winning Washington Post reporter Amy Goldstein spent years getting to know Janesville, Wisconsin, where the nation’s oldest operating General Motors plant shut down in 2008, in the midst of the Great Recession. She wove the stories of the small city and its people together in Janesville: An American Story.
Amy Brooks is the Program Director and Dramaturg for Roadside Theater, the theater wing of Appalachian grassroots arts and media center Appalshop. A 5th-generation West Virginian who returned to Appalachia just before the 2016 election cycle, Amy investigates the confluence of dramatic narrative (“What is the story we choose to tell onstage?”) and public narrative (“What is the story we are called upon to tell about ourselves, our community, and our future?”) in intercultural rural-urban performance.