Graduate Fellowship in Community-Based Research

The application process for the 2024/25 cohort is now closed - information about our new cohort will be posted here soon!

community based research process

CU Engage’s Graduate Fellowship in Community-Based Research helps train a generation of scholars in CBR practices/principles and prepares doctoral students for public scholarship careers. Emerging scholars are often forced to make a difficult choice – either engage in the community or do peer-reviewed research. The goal of this fellowship is to enable emerging scholars to build strong academic careers while working on public issues in partnership with community groups.

Applicants may propose a wide range of approaches to community based reasearch; preference will be given to projects that propose meaningful community engagement across the full research process.

Applicants must be in their 2nd-6th years during the 2024-25 academic year, and already have established a relationship with a community partner. The online application will open on February 21, 2024 and close on Friday, April 12, 2024 at 5pm. 

The CBR Fellowship program includes a cohort of around 6 PhD students, working with a CU Engage faculty member, each academic year. Fellows work together to support each other in designing, implementing CBR projects, and to explore ways of disseminating and translating knowledge gained through CBR projects. Fellows will participate in:
  • A CBR Summer Institute that introduces the Fellows to critical social theory and roots of community-based participatory research (two full day sessions).
  • In-person, bi-weekly research seminars, during Fall 2024 and Spring 2025, that focus on building the capacity of each Fellow to carry out high quality, ethical CBR.
  • Collaboratively designing and implementing a CBR Spring Showcase which will bring together Fellows, their community partners, and their academic supervisors.
  • Structured activities that guide them through the process of writing 3 short pieces about their CBR project. We will consider the ways in which these pieces could be integrated in a scholarly journal article, conference presentation, and/or funding application. All fellows receive a stipend to support their participation and CBR work.
There are two different options for stipends:
  • Most fellows will receive $6,000 stipends, paid as supplement/overload appointments to .50 GRA or GPTIs. There are no tuition credits or health benefits connected to this award. This stipend is not available to students who already have both a GRA/GPTI and an overload appointment.
  • One fellow will serve as the Cohort Organizer. They will help support planning and administration of the program: this includes help coordinating the bi-weekly seminar (schedule, readings, guest lecturers), planning special events, and helping to promote the visibility of the program on campus. Funding for this position is flexible. It could set up as:
    • A .25 Graduate Research Appointment (GRA) to support work as a cohort organizer + cohort participant in fall of 2024, with $3000 to support their participation in Fellowship activities during the spring of 2025, or
    • $3000 to support their participation in Fellowship activities during fall 2024, anda .25 Graduate Research Appointment (GRA) to support work as a cohort organizer + cohort participant in the spring 2025.
  • Funding (see above for the two options)
  • Membership in supportive community of community based researchers
  • Professional development and training to become skilled practitioners of CBR
  • Mentoring and supervision from leading experts in CBR
  • To participate in the CBR Summer Institute, which introduces the Fellows to critical social theory and roots of community-based participatory research (two 4-hour sessions).
  • To participate in-person, bi-weekly research seminars, during Fall 2024 and Spring 2025, that focus on building the capacity of each Fellow to carry out high quality, ethical CBR.
  • To collaborate on the design and implementation of a CBR Spring Showcase which will bring together Fellows, their community partners, and their academic supervisors.
  • To complete a series of structured activities that guide you through the process of writing 3 short pieces about your CBR project. These should be polished pieces that could be integrated in a scholarly journal article, conference presentation, and/or funding application.
  • To develop and submit updates to demonstrate consistent progress on a plan for collaborative work with your community partner.
CU Boulder doctoral students from any department are eligible to apply. Past cohorts have included graduate students from disciplines such as Mechanical Engineering, Ethnic Studies, Education, Computer Science, and Geography. Applicants must be in their 2nd-6th years during the 2024-25 academic year, and already have established a relationship with a community partner. Eligible projects are those where CU doctoral students collaborate with people outside of the university to formulate a research or creative project that examines an issue of public concern and leads to new ideas for policy or practice. Note that community partners must be groups whose primary membership is not employees or students of CU Boulder; these groups should be guided by missions of strengthening democracy, the resilience of communities, or the quality of public-serving institutions. They can be located anywhere in the world, so long as the applicant can demonstrate plans for meaningful, equitable collaboration despite geographic distance.
Applications are due by April 12, 2024 and will open soon. Applications will include the following elements:
  • Student information questions (enter answers to the questions on form)
  • Curriculum Vitae (file upload)
  • Project proposal (file upload)
  • Letter of support from a community partner (file upload)
  • Letter of support from a faculty supervisor (file upload)

Project proposals should be no more than 1500 words (not including References). Your proposal should include the following sub-sections:

  • Rationale for the project (500 words).
  • Proposed research methodology (500 words).
  • Anticipated project significance (250 words).
  • Personal professional narrative (250 words).
  • References (not included in total word count). Works cited in your proposal.
Strong proposals should:
  • Demonstrate familiarity with the ideas and concepts of public scholarship, community-based research, or participatory action research. You do not need to be an expert - but you should show understanding of core commitments. (See suggested readings at the bottom of this page).
  • Clearly describe the research partner’s role in defining, identifying, or shaping the research question.
  • Provide evidence of an established relationship with a community partner.
  • Focus on questions or topics that reflect concerns for people in communities, schools, or neighborhoods facing complex public challenges. We give priority to partnerships with people or organizations working with historically marginalized communities and projects that work to promote equity.
  • Demonstrate how the project advances the applicant’s scholarly goals and interests. This means that the proposal:
    • Has a strong connection to the applicant’s dissertation interests, either as pilot work or the dissertation itself
    • Shows support from faculty advisor in home department
    • Integrates a compelling community or public need with a compelling scholarly contribution to student’s academic field or emerging scholarly field of CBR
  • Demonstrate that the applicant has, either through lived experience, social identity, or professional experience, deep understanding of the communities and/or social contexts where they aim to do their work.
  • Demonstrate that the applicant plans to work in collaboration with their community partner during the 2024-25 academic year.

Please email vandna.sinha@colorado.edu or cuengage@colorado.edu with additional questions.

Aaron, KF, & O’Toole TP (2003). Community-based participatory research (Special issue). J Gen 
Intern Med 18(7):592-594. 


Hall, B.L.: From margins to center: The development and purpose of participatory action research. Am Sociologist 23:15-28, 1992. 


Israel, B. A. et al. (1998). Review of community-based research: Assessing 
partnership approaches to improve public health. Annu Rev Public Health 19:173-202.



Ansley F., & Gaventa, J.: Researching for democracy and democratizing research. Change, January- February, 1997, pp. 46-53. 


Minkler, M. (2004). Ethical challenges for the “outside” researcher in community-based participatory research. Health Education & Behavior, 31(6), 684–697. doi:10.1177/1090198104269566

Nyden, PW, Wiewel, W: Collaborative research: Harnessing the tensions between researcher and practitioner. Am Sociol 24:43-55, 1992.


Strand, K., Marullo, S., Cutforth, N., Stoecker, R., & Donohue, P. (2003). Community-based research and higher education. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Tisdahl, et al. (2014). Guidelines for peer reviewing community based research. URBAN Publications Committee. Retrieved from http://urbanresearchnetwork.org

Torre, M. E., & Fine, M. (2008). Engaging youth in participatory inquiry for social justice. In M. Pollack (ed.), Everyday anti-racism: Getting real about race in school. New York: New Press.

We give priority to partnerships with people or organizations working with historically marginalized communities or projects that work to promote equity. Because we want to encourage graduate students to align CBR with their academic training and traditions, we are open to a range of types of projects. Although the language of community-based research tends to prioritize social science or citizen science methods, we welcome applications from the arts and humanities which characterize their research as creative work.

CBR Fellows