University of Richmond
EN-10: Community Partnerships

The Bonner Center for Civic Engagement (CCE) partners with organizations throughout Richmond to provide student volunteers, student interns, space for meetings and events, research collaboration, and faculty expertise. The CCE's community partner organizations work to address issues like food access, environmental health, access to education, social justice, public health, and environmental justice. The CCE sends Bonner Scholars (students who receive a scholarship in exchange for serving weekly for 3.5 years with one local organization), students in community-based learning (CBL) classes, and other interested students to work regularly with the James River Park System and affiliated local organizations working to conserve natural resources within the James River watershed. Additionally, the CCE regularly supports students to serve at Shalom Farms, Tricycle Gardens, and Peter Paul Development Center’s community garden, all of which work to get healthy, fresh food to Richmond’s families in need. The CCE also provides faculty development to equip professors to teach community-based learning (CBL) classes and serve partner organizations, and provides funding for CBL courses. The CCE's Civic Fellowship Program provides funding for continuing, degree-seeking undergraduate students completing otherwise unpaid, academically grounded summer internships with community partner organizations. This provides organizations focused on addressing sustainability issues with interns they may not otherwise be able to employ. Civic Fellows have secured internships locally, nationally, and internationally in the arts, education, the environment, human rights, community development, political advocacy, public health, criminal justice, international diplomacy, and other areas. Some sustainability related organizations that fellows have worked with during the past couple years include Virginia Interfaith Power & Light (focused on bringing together all faith communities to mobilize a religious response to climate change through energy conservation, energy efficiency, and renewable energy), the Fair Food Network, and the City of Richmond Planning and Development Review. For community members, the CCE offers a Community Partner-in-Residence Fellowship, which provides recipients from the nonprofit sector with a stipend, work space at the University, connections to University employees and students, and access to University facilities. The first recipient of this fellowship is Queen Shabaz, founder of United Parents Against Lead & Other Environmental Hazards. Laslty, the CCE provides community partner organizations with space for meetings and events through the UR Downtown location and sheds light on work with community partners by providing gallery space for exhibitions about projects and events for faculty, students, and community partners to talk about their work. Many of the CCE's community partners work for the benefit of underrepresented groups and vulnerable populations. Examples include Interfaith Power and Light, Habitat for Humanity, Peter Paul Development Center (dedicated to educating children, engaging families, and empowering the community in Richmond's vulnerable East End neighborhood), Home Again Family Shelter, Shalom Farms (a regional food access project), and Tricycle Urban Agriculture. Some of the many community partners serving vulnerable or underrepresented populations involve those same people in their planning and decision-making processes. https://engage.richmond.edu/

RVAH2O is a partnership between the city of Richmond Department of Public Utilities and community stakeholders, like University of Richmond, aimed at reducing pollution, decreasing flooding, and keeping water in the city fishable and swimmable. University of Richmond faculty and staff participated in the formation of the city's Integrated Clean Water Plan through the RVA H2O initiative in the form of a Technical Workgroup that provided technical insight and feedback during the planning process. The Hispanic Chamber of Commerce and various city council districts were engaged as part of a special interest and public stakeholder group. Moreover, Neighborhood Associations throughout the city were engaged while the plan was promoted. The University provides water quality data from campus to help the RVAH2O initiative assess how they are progressing towards meeting their wider water quality goals for the city. http://www.rvah2o.org/planning-for-the-future

The East End Cemetery is a historic African American burial ground in Richmond City and Henrico County, Virginia. In order to support efforts to restore the cemetery, which has long been overgrown and insufficiently documented, faculty and students from University of Richmond teamed up with Virginia Commonwealth University and Friends of East End Cemetery to form the East End Cemetery Collaboratory. Through this partnership, students and faculty at UR from the Biology Department, Department of Geography and the Environment, and the Classical Studies department have mapped the cemetery, cleared out overgrown areas, and studied demography, ecology, gravestone symbolism, medical sociology and personal histories at the site. https://news.richmond.edu/features/article/-/14916/east-end-cemetery-collaboratory--ur-and-vcu-deepen-connections-to-historic-african-american-cemetery.html https://news.richmond.edu/releases/article/-/15272/ur-partners-with-vcu-and-friends-of-east-end-to-unveil-new-mapping-projects-in-support-of-reclamation-efforts-at-east-end-cemetery.html https://dsl.richmond.edu/eastend/