Collaborative Partnerships Between Metro East Communities and SIUE
The SIUE Successful Communities Collaborative (SSCC) is a one-year program that supports partnerships between the University and communities in Illinois to meet sustainability-identified needs.
How the Collaborative Works
The Collaborative selects a single partner community, city or county, through a competitive application process and works with them to identify projects that will be beneficial to the community. Each project is connected with one or more key courses at SIUE that can provide research or technical support and move the project forward.
Special Projects & Initiatives
2023 SSCC Speaker Series
Through a generous donation from SIU Trustee John Simmons, SSCC hosted its first Speaker Series in spring 2023. The series is designed to be a think-and-do tank, with each speaker being paired with a SSCC Faculty Fellow, 2 SIUE student researchers, and a local community partner to explore issues around food justice in the Metro East with an eye toward providing solutions that can be implemented in other communities.
Research Teams:
Susan M. Kooiman- Faculty member
Tylor Dove- Student researcher
Emma Warner- Student researcher
St. Louis Metropolitan Area- Community partners
Report:
Press releases:
- SIUE to Host Inaugural Speaker Series
- Steve Sonka to Present at SIUE’s SSCC Speaker Series
- Dr. Bobby Smith Addresses Food Justice during SIUE’s Speaker Series
- Our Daily Show: Ft. Successful Communities Collaborative, Evelyn King, and MORE!
Community-Oriented Digital Engagement Scholars
Community-Oriented Digital Engagement Scholars, or CODES, launched in fall 2021 and provides a pathway for students who want to replace their general education coursework for hands-on learning experiences for credit. In CODES, students practice creative problem solving and learn new technical skills like mapping, data visualization and communicating online as they share their collaborative research with real audiences in the community.
Press releases:
- Community-Oriented Digital Engagement Scholars Welcomed to SIUE
- SIUE CODES Project Secures $100K NEH Grant
SIUE Truth, Racial Healing and Transformation Campus Center
In January 2020, the American Association of Colleges and Universities (AAC&U) named SIUE a host location for a Truth, Racial Healing and Transformation (TRHT) Campus Center. Organized around the five pillars of the TRHT framework—narrative change, racial healing and relationship building, separation, law, and the economy—the TRHT Campus Centers seek to prepare the next generation of leaders to confront racism and dismantle the belief in a hierarchy of human value. In support of this mission, the SIUE TRHT Campus Center endeavors to fundamentally alter the ways that institutions, practices, policies and people have served to reinforce systemic racial oppression in the Metro East.
SSCC facilitates community partnerships for TRHT. The integration of TRHT and SSCC results in more equitable access to high impact practices (HIPs) for SIUE students because community-identified needs are embedded into courses in which students are enrolled. This is important because HIPs are recognized for their positive impact on retention and learning outcomes for students across many backgrounds. As community and campus stakeholders collaborate and achieve goals together, truths can be revealed, authentic relationships can be formed, and racial equity can be advanced.
Press releases:
