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Commentary on the papers of the special issue identifies and discusses four themes: 1) strategies to bridge the gap between science and practice, 2) sources of community science questions of interest, 3) choice and quality of methods, and 4) epistemology and useful language for community science. The commentary identifies some limitations in the models proposed by the special issue authors, and proposes renewed attention to ecology, context and process in community change initiatives, calling for a common set of community level measures as one strategy to advance a community centered science agenda. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite the popularity and noted utility of Wandersman and colleagues' (2008) Interactive Systems Framework, the literature currently provides a primary focus on delivery organizations' and supportive stakeholders' capacities and strategies to implement innovations, presenting a critical gap in understanding. Unfortunately, reflective of a larger void in community dissemination and implementation efforts, there is a more limited focus on the dissemination of innovations. This paper presents the social marketing literature as a supplement to the Prevention Synthesis and Translation System ( PSTS), the system responsible for dissemination. The study and practice of innovation synthesis and translation is examined in the literature; and based on the conclusions drawn, social marketing theory is used to provide a systematic approach to improving dissemination within the Interactive Systems Framework. Specifically, three gaps related to the PSTS are identified in the literature that align with and can be filled using social marketing. Social marketing is defined and presented as a supplement by providing theory and practices, within a systems context, for effectively communicating and influencing change. By blending social marketing with the Interactive Systems Framework, the aim is to improve the understanding of strategic communication and its role in the effective dissemination, and subsequent implementation, of innovations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a new approach to the design and implementation of community change efforts like a System of Care. Called the ABLe Change Framework, the model provides simultaneous attention to the content and process of the work, ensuring effective implementation and the pursuit of systems change. Three key strategies are employed in this model to ensure the integration of content and process efforts and effective mobilization of broad scale systems change: Systemic Action Learning Teams, Simple Rules, and Small Wins. In this paper we describe the ABLe Change Framework and present a case study in which we successfully applied this approach to one system of care effort in Michigan. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper describes the Rhode Island Tobacco Control Enhancement Project (TCEP), a state-university-community technical assistance system. TCEP was developed under the auspices of the Rhode Island Department of Health's Tobacco Control program and was designed to build capacity among nine community-based organizations to mount comprehensive tobacco control interventions in five diverse communities within the state. This paper: (1) provides a description of community mobilization ; (2) presents a logic model for planning and decision making used by state-university-community partners; (3) describes training, technical assistance services and implementation; and, (4) describes the evaluation and program improvement activities used to support on-going project development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper describes the use of a theory of change approach to community-based cross-agency service planning for children with serious emotional disturbance and their families. Public agency planners in Contra Costa County, California used the theory of change approach to organize service planning for a population of youth who had been arrested and involved with juvenile probation. The theory of change process described in this paper links community outcomes with planned activities with the assumptions or principles that underlie the community planning efforts. When complete, a theory of change logic model can serve as a guide for implementation, ensuring that community plans for service delivery remain true to their intent. The theory of change development process includes twelve stages and is based on a step-by-step approach. Theory of change logic models establish a context for articulating a community's shared beliefs and prompt local stakeholders to establish logical connections between the population to be served, expected results, and strategies intended to achieve those results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper describes the authors’ work in a community that received Federal funding for an integrated system of care to reduce the impact and incidence of exposure to violence for children less than six years of age. The paper includes a review of the conceptual framework that guided the work of the authors and provides a brief overview of the issue of family violence, the impact of this violence on young children, and the Federal response to this issue. In addition, a description of the Initiative and the community in which it was based is provided along with some aspects of the evaluation plan. Finally, the authors discuss how their work with this Initiative depicts an approach to facilitating change within communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the role of member participation in decision-making (PDM) from an organizational learning (OL) perspective. Community-based organizations (CBOs) serve as mediators between the individual and the local community, often providing the means for community member participation and benefiting organizationally from members' input. Community psychologists have recognized these benefits; however, the field has paid less attention to the role participation plays in increasing CBOs' capacity to meet community needs. We present a framework for exploring how CBO contextual factors influence the use of participatory decision-making structures and practices, and how these affect OL. We then use the framework to examine PDM in qualitative case study analysis of four CBOs: a youth development organization, a faith-based social action coalition, a low-income neighborhood organization, and a large human service agency. We found that organizational form, energy, and culture each had a differential impact on participation in decision making within CBOs. We highlight how OL is constrained in CBOs and document how civic aims and voluntary membership enhanced participation and learning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Systems change has emerged as a dominant frame through which local, state, and national funders and practitioners across a wide array of fields approach their work. In most of these efforts, change agents and scholars strive to shift human services and community systems to create better and more just outcomes and improve the status quo. Despite this, there is a dearth of frameworks that scholars, practitioners, and funders can draw upon to aid them in understanding, designing, and assessing this process from a systemic perspective. This paper provides one framework—grounded in systems thinking and change literatures—for understanding and identifying the fundamental system parts and interdependencies that can help to explain system functioning and leverage systems change. The proposed framework highlights the importance of attending to both the deep and apparent structures within a system as well as the interactions and interdependencies among these system parts. This includes attending to the dominant normative, resource, regulative, and operational characteristics that dictate the behavior and lived experiences of system members. The value of engaging critical stakeholders in problem definition, boundary construction, and systems analysis are also discussed. The implications of this framework for systems change researchers and practitioners are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Evaluation descriptions in the research literature tend to ignore the full context of the community change efforts from which they emerged. In this paper, we describe a range of evaluation studies and data collection activities conducted over the course of one state’s effort to reform its child welfare system on behalf of families with children experiencing serious mental health problems. Initial activities included studies of the prevalence of unmet mental health need in children and youth in the state. As these needs were addressed, evaluation activities examined the impact of a pilot wraparound program that became a major part of systems reform. Later efforts included implementation analysis of wraparound programs and assessment of priorities for continued systems reform. As we describe this set of evaluation activities, we discuss how data collection evolved to meet the needs of stakeholders over time and consider lessons learned about the roles of research and information sharing in shaping community change efforts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

One of the challenges facing nonprofit organizations today is the demand for measurable results. Increasingly, these organizations are focusing less on program outputs and program outcomes in favor of community outcomes or changes demonstrated in the larger community. Success by 6® is a popular United Way initiative that emphasizes defining and measuring community outcomes. In this paper, we describe our work with 24 Success by 6® initiatives around the country. It is clear that not all of these initiatives are measuring community outcomes. Of those initiatives that are experiencing some success measuring community outcomes, similar measurement strategies are reported. Additionally, our experience suggests several United Way employees express dissatisfaction with the logic model as a framework for defining and measuring community outcomes although no preferred alternative model is identified. Evaluators working with community-wide initiatives must find ways to communicate the differences between program and community outcomes to key stakeholders and funders. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper provides a historical case study of efforts to implement and sustain “outcomes based funding” in a large United Way system in Central Ohio. The case study describes how community practitioners employed specific strategies to promote sustainability. The use of these strategies corresponds to several techniques suggested in the sustainability literature. This case study is offered as a means of considering how practitioners helped sustain the shift to outcomes based funding within the United Way system. In addition, this case study demonstrates how skills related to implementation and sustainability might be transferred to other situations where practitioners are interested in promoting change within large organizations and/or communities. The authors suggest that skills related to implementation and sustainability are essential to community practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, the field of community psychology has given considerable attention to how research and evaluation methods should be designed to support our goals of empowerment and social justice. Yet, as a field, we have given much less attention to whether the use of our methods actually achieves or supports our empowerment agenda. With the primary purpose of beginning to establish the norm of reporting on the impacts of our methods, this paper reports on the findings from interviews of 16 youth and adults who had participated in one participatory evaluation method (Photovoice). Two specific questions were examined: (1) What is the impact of participating in a Photovoice effort; and (2) How does the method of Photovoice foster these impacts? Overall, participants noted that they were significantly affected by their experiences as photographers and through their dialogue with neighbors during Photovoice group sessions. Impacts ranged from an increased sense of control over their own lives to the emergence of the kinds of awareness, relationships, and efficacy supportive of participants becoming community change agents. According to participants, Photovoice fostered these changes by (a) empowering them as experts on their lives and community, (b) fostering deep reflection, and (c) creating a context safe for exploring diverse perspectives. The implications of these findings for the science and practice of community psychology are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]