SUNY ESF Center For Community Design Research

Hello everyone! We are the Near Westside Team Research Team, and this is our year 3 CNCS members. Left —> Right: Nicky, Michelle, Jylecia, Maddie and Maren. Nicky, Jy and Maddie are our teen researchers and have been working hard to share the pervious years work with the community. Follow our page to see what we’ve been up to!

We are working on two projects with local community partners this summer, both virtually and not in-person due to the Covid-19 restrictions. Although very different from each other, they both engage neighborhood residents in exploring issues of importance to them, the broader community and beyond.
Our “community conversations” participatory research project is in its second year. Formally titled “Raising the Next Generation of Community Leaders: A participatory research project with teenagers of the Near Westside Neighborhood of Syracuse, NY”, we call it the Teen Research Project.
Funded by the Corporation for National and Community Service (CNCS) the team has been engaging other residents and partners in exploring questions related to how crime and violence affects the lives of people in the neighborhood. In Year 2 we have a team of six teen researchers working in collaboration with Profs Maren King and Dr Christina Limpert; Leah Russell and staff of the Syracuse Peacemaking Center; and resident Yanira Johnson as the neighborhood project assistant. This spring and summer two ESF LA students are helping the team create posters about their process and findings. This summer the teens will also be working with the Peacemaking Center on action projects related to their research. We’ll provide more regular updates on their progress.
Earlier this spring the team met with representatives of the the Syracuse Parks Dept and the Syracuse Police Dept to review their findings.

A story from SUNY about the work we are doing with the Arcahaie Haiti community, locally based organizations organizations and other SUNY colleagues.

A Master Plan Comes to Life for the Sustainable Village and Learning Community in Haiti | Big Ideas Blog In November, it was anounced that SUNY was undertaking a collaborative partnership to create a Sustainable Village and Learning Community (SVLC) in Akayè, Haiti.