[Watch] Approaches to and Lessons Learned from Community-Engaged Research

Sydney Diavua

Good afternoon, and welcome to Connecting Communities. Thank you for joining us for today’s webinar, Approaches to and Lessons Learned from Community-Engaged Research. I’m Sydney Diavua, Assistant Vice President of Community Development at the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, and I’ll serve as your moderator for today’s session.

I would now like to take the time to introduce our speakers for today. Jamilica Burke, Chief Strategy and Impact Officer for Seeding Success, where she works to create strategic opportunities for collective impact in order to drive systems-level change in the cradle-to-career continuum.

Celeste Frye, Chief Executive Officer for Public Works Partners. In her role, Celeste specializes in developing programs grounded in data, analysis, and management practices, engaging stakeholders to support the development of equitable spaces, and driving community development initiatives.

Chioke Mose-Telesford, Director of Improving Practices and Outcomes at Corporation for a Skilled Workforce. Chioke manages a portfolio of work centered on strengthening the capacity of workforce professionals and organizations to develop more effective services and policies to increase economic mobility for workers, particularly workers of color.

Sarah Miller, Principal Adviser Community and Economic Development at the Atlanta Fed. In her role, she conducts research and engagement on effective workforce and labor market investments, occupational and career pathways, and workforce and labor market strategies that aim to address long-term economic mobility and resilience.

Ashley Putnam, Director of the Economic Growth and Mobility Project at the Philadelphia Fed. In her role, she leads a multi-level effort to bring about entrepreneurial solutions to achieve inclusive growth, economic growth, and create pathways out of poverty in communities across the third Federal Reserve district and the nation.

And Paula Tkac, Executive Vice President and Director of Research at the Atlanta Fed where she serves as primary monetary policy at Pfizer to Atlanta Fed President Bostic and is actively involved in strategic leadership at both the division and organizational levels. Before we get started, let’s move to slide four where we can take care of a few housekeeping items.

Views expressed during this session are those of the speakers and are intended for informational purposes only. They do not necessarily represent the views of Fed Communities or the Federal Reserve System.

Please use the Q&A feature throughout the session to submit questions. We promise to get to as many of them as possible during the Q&A portion of this presentation. Let’s keep the going and engage with us on X, formerly known as Twitter, using the hashtag #connectingcommunities and visit fedcommunities.org for a variety of CD articles, resources, and data across the Federal Reserve system. And finally, this session will be recorded, and the presentation video and podcast will be available on fedcommunities.org within two weeks of this event.

I would now like to turn the presentation over to my Atlanta Fed colleague, Paula Tkac. Paula, the floor is yours.

Paula Tkac

Thank you, Sydney. Good afternoon, and thank you all for joining us. I’m really excited to be kicking off the program today. Throughout my career as an economist, I’ve combined quantitative and qualitative data to better understand how financial markets work and how policies and regulation can enhance the stability of our financial system, support our economy. And now in my role as the research director in Atlanta, it’s been fascinating to learn about the world of community and economic development research methods, how these methods can drive impactful change by enriching our understanding of the economy through community perspectives.

Today you’re going to hear about research that empowers rather than extracts, that encourages actions, and that builds skills in communities. Community development staff members at the Federal Reserve are working to encourage the use of research like this, engaged research, in our own community development work. Let me tell you about one example of some engaged research that the Fed has done and why it was essential to fulfilling our dual mandate to ensure price stability and maximum employment.

This dual mandate demands a deep understanding of the labor market. Now, the nation’s labor market is always fluid, but it has been especially unpredictable since the COVID-19 pandemic. If the pandemic has taught all of us nothing else, it demonstrated that what we think we know can change almost overnight. Especially in these uncertain conditions, it’s especially important to dig beneath the aggregate data. That means adding in other more granular data, and importantly, going directly to employers and to workers to learn how they’re experiencing their opportunities and challenges in the labor market.

To understand workers’ experiences, we talk to real people. The Fed’s Worker Voices project conducted a series of focus groups with workers and job seekers without bachelor’s degrees during the summer of 2022. Through these conversations, we learned that even amid the labor shortage, numerous workers expressed frustration with how potential employers responded to job applications and arranged interviews despite their efforts to lower barriers to openings. We also heard about the financial insecurity born of job instability and the effect on the health and wellbeing of families. On the other hand, participants in the project also told us that they plan to seek agency and stability in future job searches rather than simply settling for the first offer that get. We value these insights because they add layers and nuance to what we learn from our more traditional quantitative data sets.

One unique aspect of the Worker Voices project was how it engaged the focus group participants beyond the focus groups themselves. Workers were engaged throughout the research, design, and implementation process. Workers offered insights to improve the screening questionnaire used to source focus group participants, to help iterate on the facilitation guide used in each focus group, and to validate research findings to ensure framing and language use really resonated with their experiences. Importantly, these conversations confirmed that findings were accurate to worker experience and perspective.

We also put that community-engaged data to use. Research grounded in real people’s experience can help see deeper study and eventually yield tools for those on the front lines promoting economic inclusion. Another example, this one from our work here at the Atlanta Fed, is our Advancing Careers initiative. Advancing Careers evolved out of a listening to families and career counselors, and from research showing that benefits cliffs constitute barriers to economic mobility. Our Advancing Careers team developed a suite of analytical tools used by workforce development agencies, human service organizations, and others across the country to help people navigate these benefits cliffs. In addition, the tools informed two new laws aimed at helping Floridians surmount benefits cliffs.

Now, there’s a disclaimer. The Federal Reserve does not lobby for legislation. We offer policymakers and practitioners independent data and intelligence, but we are proud to be a part of informing these really important public policy debates. This is what we mean when we talk about doing our part to build an economy that works for everyone.

As the Federal Reserve does more to connect with real people in the economy, we’re learning that it has the greatest impact when we follow a set of best practices. How do we do it ethically without being extractive and in a way that creates a meaningful space at the table? Community-engaged research is an equitable approach to research which invites all stakeholders to participate beyond the role of research subject. It allows everyone to participate in the process, elevating the expertise of all involved. The Federal Reserve System has been building our research capabilities in this domain, and today we’re pleased to highlight examples of community-engaged research and partners we’ve worked with on our own journey. We will also share how your institution, organization, or community can leverage the same principles in your work.

With that, I will pass the mic back to today’s moderator to introduce our panelists.

Sydney Diavua

Thank you, Paula. So I would now like to invite our panelists to join me on screen, and as they’re joining me, we’d like to poll the audience to learn a little bit about you. You’ll see a poll appear on the screen. What type of organization do you work for? The options are research institute, community-based organization, workforce intermediary, economic development organization, academic institute, and other.

Thank you for filling out this poll and helping us know a little bit about who’s in the room. We’ve also got another polling question for you. Where are you on your community-engaged research approach? Our options are, you’re not sure where to start, planning stages, you’re starting engagement and outreach, collecting and analyzing data, or other. So I’ll give you just a moment to fill out the poll.

And now, I’d like to turn and transition to our panel, who you’ve heard a bit about before. Chioke, Celeste, Jamilica, thank you for joining me here.

Chioke Mose-Telesford

Thank you for having me.

Sydney Diavua

We’ve heard a little bit about your backgrounds, and you all represent a variety of organizations across different regions, but you all have community-engaged research in common. So I’d like to start from hearing from each of you how you use community-engaged research in your work. What elements of your work make it community-engaged? And how about we start with you, Celeste?

Celeste Frye

Sure. Hi. As was mentioned, I’m Celeste Frye, Public Works Partners is based in New York City as well as LA, Los Angeles, southern California, and we work on projects across the country. And community-engaged research is foundational to what we do. We bring the tools of research and social science together also with the tools of urban planning and human centered design concepts as well. Because our values mean for us that we always want to meet people where they are, we believe that it is essential to plan with communities and to conduct research with communities and stakeholders, not on them. And so, that’s the philosophy part, and I know we’ll talk more about how it really happens as we get into more questions.

Sydney Diavua

Thanks, Celeste. Jamilica, what about you?

Jamilica Burke

Hi, good afternoon everybody, and thank you for this opportunity. Again, I’m Jamilica Burke. I’m Chief Strategy Impact Officer with Seeding Success, and we are based in Memphis, Tennessee, and our organization is a collective impact organization that is also part of the Strive Together national network. And for us, we have looked at this question in multiple ways with the different projects that we’ve done over our 10 years of existence. But a large part of it does focus, as what Celeste talked about, in how do we ensure that the individuals that we’re looking to impact our work are at the table for the discussions? And we wanted to make sure that we were able to train and support them so they can be full participants in this work.

A large part of our work is really focused on the balance between bringing public systems and community together in a meaningful way to really make strategic visions and build strategies around how can we really transform the systems and ensure resources are getting to the people who need the most. And so, a large part of how we’ve been able to do that is, one, really building on our philosophy around continuous improvement results-based facilitation, training residents and other individuals that have been a part of the work to understand these concepts and theories so that they can also help us to go out into the communities in which they live so that they can share that information, they can help us gather information as we go on this journey together.

Also, we’ve partnered with our local research institution to where they have supported us in training organizations and residents that have been at the table around participatory action research. And how do we infuse that into the discussions we’re having, how to make evidence-informed surveys and focus groups and interviews so that we’re really getting to the root causes of the information that is needed to really help make meaningful decisions? And where has it really played a big part in our work is, because our work is very steep in public policy, also balancing how do you bring this qualitative knowledge into more of a quantitative and public policy frame so that overarching, we really have a blueprint of how we work together in order to meet the outcomes we’re looking to achieve, which ultimately is about improving social and economic mobility.

Sydney Diavua

Thanks, Jamilica. I know we’ll get a little bit more into how you all have trained residents as facilitators. Chioke, how about you?

Chioke Mose-Telesford

Yeah, so thank you all for joining and listening in. So CSW, we’re a national nonprofit that does work, as Sydney mentioned, to advance the economic mobility of low-wage workers, with a focus on black and brown workers and those historically excluded from opportunity. And so, we partner with a lot of different folks. We don’t do direct service, but we’re working with community-based organizations, funders in some instances, government, education institutions to really resolve some thorny issues, build capacity, make recommendations, whether it’s policy or practice, to ensure that all folks have a family sustaining income for all and it’s equitable.

But when we do work with partners, we’re really intentional about bringing community and the intended end user to the table into that project design, even if it’s not explicitly asked for. And we’ll talk about the nuances of the how, but I think what’s interesting is that when we’ve done this work in a lot of our projects, even most recently, sometimes we find that it shifts the intended outcome of why someone’s asking us to come to the table. It blows up the assumptions that people have, and I think for us it’s really about understanding who that community means for that project. In some instances it might be learners and workers, and in some instances it’s really saying, “Actually, we need to talk, based on what you’re asking us to do, to your frontline staff because they’re going to be the users of this tool, or the users of this information.” And I would say, making sure that the full perspective of all beneficiaries are at the table.

And I think you asked the question of like, well, why? And I think we’ve all kind of probably been in situations where you bring an evidence-based solution to the table, but it falls flat because it’s not rooted in the context or reality of that person’s space and place. And so, that’s kind of why we do a lot of work to ensure that community is at the table, whoever community means in that instance. I’ll say, Sydney, is that just naming, is there room for us to grow in this? Absolutely. And so, I think, for us, when we move forward with all of our work, we really want to be even more intentional about how we pull in folks with lived expertise to our projects, how we train them, like Jamilica’s doing with her work, in all projects to lead the conversations and build that capacity in whatever organization, neighborhood, or community we’re doing the work in.

Sydney Diavua

I like how you threw out challenging assumptions. I think that, through the work that all of you all will highlight today, we’ll hear a little bit about how you’re thinking about how we challenge assumptions through that work. Can I go to Celeste and just talk a little bit more about Public Works Partners and the work that you do? Because you highlighted how your work impacts policy decisions and economic development projects. And so, how do you engage community intentionally as it’s impacting policy decisions?

Celeste Frye

Thank you. And I have to say, it’s so inspiring to hear from the other folks on this panel. Thank you. So a couple of examples. Community-engaged research, as I mentioned, forms the foundation of how we do our work. And so, then we’re looking for outcomes to then share, whether that’s with an individual organization or with a policy policymaking entity or government to create change and make things better, again, for that community that we’re working with.

I have lots of examples, but one that I’ve just been sitting here thinking of that was particularly fun was, we did a project with Lincoln Center’s arts education arm. And they wanted to evaluate and develop an evidence base about how their work of sending arts educators into elementary and middle schools in a particular school district in the Bronx and New York, how effective was that being? So from a community perspective, we conducted research hand-in-hand in focus groups and one-on-one conversations with educators and administrators, with groups of parents, also with third and fifth graders, which was a lot of fun. We did some really creative workshops.

And one of the surprising things that we found was, we all went in assuming that arts education would help kids be more aware of the arts, but what we found was that arts education helps kids learn to read, and it helps kids learn to do math better. And not only did we hear that from people, from those who were doing the work, but we also developed an evidence base around it. So then, the New York City Public Schools was able to use that to actually expand the work that they were doing with art education around the city, so it had a really profound impact on how arts education is integrated into particularly elementary school curriculums in New York City.

We also worked, we have done some work with the Federal Reserve Banks in one, similar with what, Jamilica, you were saying was, we worked with childcare, with organizations that work with childcare workers, and also with childcare workers themselves. We trained folks to conduct focus groups of their peers because that way they could speak the language that other childcare providers in their community spoke. They could ask the kinds of questions that would get at the information that we were really trying to find, and also it was an opportunity for the childcare providers that we were working directly with to become more thoughtful and critical of the work that they were doing and the policy environment that they themselves had to function in.

So that’s just two examples of where we have – then that work, those childcare workers were then able to conduct focus groups with other childcare providers, which then informed the policymaking lens that the Fed was taking to childcare investments and its impact on economic development. So there’s a lot of different ways that you can approach community-engaged research. And I really think one of the important first questions that you have to ask yourself is, what do we mean by community? Who are the stakeholders in this particular issue that we’re trying to learn more about? Because sometimes it’s surprising.

Sydney Diavua

It is, and as you’re talking about who are the stakeholders, it’s interesting that one of your stakeholder groups were the third through fifth graders, which I’m sure you can share a lot of lessons on how do you do research with third through fifth graders. And someone probably will drop that question in the chat. But another stakeholder group one of you all has worked with has been thinking about vulnerable populations and the workforce. And so, Chioke, I want to come to you. And if you can share a little bit more about the work at CSW and the Michigan Justice Fund and just, especially as you’re engaged with vulnerable populations who are operating in the labor force, what’s been the impact of that work?

Chioke Mose-Telesford

So for those that aren’t aware, Michigan Justice Fund is a funders collaborative aimed to address the impact of mass incarceration in the state of Michigan. And so, we’ve been working with them to inform their economic mobility strategy for justice-impacted individuals. And when we originally started with them, they were kind of like, “Well, what do we do?” And so, there’s a lot of evidence-based models and practices that can be leveraged, a lot of levers that we know can probably be pulled and make a big impact. We recognized it was extremely important to go to those most impacted.

And so, we recognize we have to talk to those who are impacted by the criminal legal system to understand. How have you experienced the workforce system and employment opportunities? How have you navigated through the various services and programs? What characteristics and skills would you want out of the staff serving you? What are your career interests? For those who’ve worked in this space, oftentimes folks who are justice-impacted are kind of moved towards a certain career that we understand kind of has a lower barrier to entry.

And so, layered on that, we actually, through the Michigan Justice Fund, had the opportunity to bring on a fellow, somebody who had lived expertise and who had an interest in policy. And so, he worked with us side-by-side to develop focus group questions, to develop surveys. I think, to someone’s earlier point, language matters. And so, making sure that language isn’t jargon, language aligns and lands with the folks that you’re trying to work with. And so, that information, everyone was compensated of course, but was really weaved into the recommendations that were made and informed their investment strategy and was shared right back out to the field to say, “Here’s what we heard about what folks who you are trying to serve want and need.” And I think it really has been critical at making sure that all of this work that’s being is rooted in what folks have to say.

And I think, back to the challenging assumptions, what I found interesting was, when you looked at the top career interests, it was entrepreneurship, social services, business. It wasn’t transportation and trucking, it wasn’t culinary arts, it wasn’t entry-level manufacturing. It was people really wanting to do something different. And so, that I think really centered community and the work that they’re doing and that we were doing alongside them.

Sydney Diavua

And you talked a little bit also about, you paid people for their time, and Jamilica, I think you’ve done something similar in Memphis. So I want to come to you and just to ask you, you’ve been leading projects in Memphis to enhance outcomes from cradle to career, and I’ve heard you mention that your organization is similar to the connective tissue of efforts that are ongoing. So can you tell me a little bit more about the work that you’re doing at Seeding Success? And how are you doing intentionally community-engaged work, and what are some of those elements of it? Jamilica, do we still have you?

Well, we’ll wait on Jamilica to come back to us, but Chioke, you started a little bit more about what you’ve been doing with justice-impacted individuals, a little bit I heard something from your work about benchmarking. And so, how was this connected to benchmarking? How have you been engaging in benchmarking, and how did it shape your understanding of workforce program needs?

Chioke Mose-Telesford

Yeah, so CSW has been doing some work for many years around the workforce benchmarking network, which allows organizations to compare themselves against other organizations on outcomes. And it’s a really valuable tool for learning, and also those measures of success aren’t rooted in what workforce program participants have said is success to them. And so, we did some work to really understand and answer the question, what do workforce program participants want out of their experience? What is success like to them?

And so, we got some funding to bring together an advisory council of workforce program participants. Some were alums, some were currently in their program, trained them in research, and they led focus groups, they designed the protocols, they developed a survey, did all the analysis of that to come up with six new workforce metrics rooted in the perspectives of workforce participants from mostly Philadelphia, New York City, and Detroit. And I think what was interesting, I think I’m using the word assumptions every five seconds, but it did challenge a lot of assumptions about why people are entering these programs.

And so, for context, the six new metrics that they found don’t align at all with traditional core measures that workforce programs are evaluated against. It’s sense of safety and belonging at a workforce development program and on a job, change in self-confidence or self-esteem, growth and emotional intelligence, increase in social capital. And then, the one that was kind of aligned with workforce measures was career preparedness, but it really highlighted this disconnect between what we are funded to achieve and what participants, job seekers, and learners actually want.

And for me, we’ve shared this work with a lot of organizations across the country, and they’re like, “We want to do that. We want to, one, be able to measure something different. We want to be able to build the social capital of our folks. How do you participate and have a similar participatory action research project? We want to do this.” And I think, for me, it highlighted the need for capacity and funding for these organizations to do the deep work that they need to understand what community actually wants from them and then be able to make changes within the work that they do. But it’s a really exciting project. The advisory council did better work than we could have ever done. They were able to engage and get information that folks might not have felt comfortable sharing with us as someone who’s not engaged with the program.

Sydney Diavua

So what I’m starting to hear is, first, it helps you better understand the perspectives of those that you’re seeking to understand. And it seems like, from you and Celeste, you went in with one kind of thinking on what you would learn, but it changed a little bit of what you were asking, how you asked it, from thinking about the jargon and the language we use, but also what your expected outcomes would be just based on doing more community-engaged research. So that’s a fantastic lesson for those on the call to learn.

Jamilica, I think we’ve got you back. And so, I’m going to come to you, and just tell us a little bit more about Seeding Success and how Seeding Success is playing the role of the connective tissue amongst a lot of these efforts for cradle-to-career success in Memphis.

Jamilica Burke

Yes, absolutely. And you have to love technology, but thank you everybody. But yes, here at Seeding Success, as I mentioned earlier, we’re a collective impact organization, and like Chioke, we are not a direct service provider. But we really act to the role of more so quarterback or sometimes like say connective tissue between multiple systems and multiple partners. And so, for over 10 years, we have really worked in historically convening in-school and out-of-school partners in the education space to help them holistically think, how can we more collectively work together to meet the needs and help students and families achieve their outcomes?

During that work, it also gave us an opportunity to think about, well, how are we working together strategically? What data are we looking at? How are we using some of the same learnings and trainings and opportunities? Even when thinking about bringing in additional resources to the work, we know not just philanthropy by itself can do the work. But how are we also aligning with the public sector to ensure resources are going to the right places and the right people?

So through this iteration over the years, we had an opportunity in the last three years to really work with some national and local partners around, how can we now look at making sure that we have a holistic community strategy, which is now called More for Memphis, that looks at addressing how are we improving outcomes for kids and families cradle to career. We’re really doing it by not just looking at education, but the intersecting systems that play a role within that because we know not just a teacher in a school alone can meet the needs. But it really takes a holistic approach to understand, do they have stable housing? Do they have access to health? Are they impacted by the justice system? How do we ensure that they have a pipeline to high wage, living wage positions to where they can have more choice in life?

So when you consider all of these factors across multiple systems, now you’re looking at a menu of stakeholders and systems that typically have not been in the same room together. So we work with them to understand, well, what would be those core strategies that we can all work towards implementing together in this more comprehensive plan? And how do we ensure that we, to the point of this, have community at the table to ensure what evidence says, what our data says really aligns to what the community and the people on the ground that we’re looking to impact say that they need as well?

And so, me talking about challenging assumptions, I started this work saying, “Oh, we’ll have this done in about a year.” Well, it took three. Lesson learned, but we came out of this with a plan that we can all truly be proud of because it has been informed by community and not just residents, but also youth. And during that process, as I mentioned earlier, we were able to train them. We paid them for their participation. We also helped when there was opportunities to connect them to opportunities because we had some people that were able to go through this work and then able to build their credit scores, get in a car, get an apartment, get in a house, being able to transition and go to a higher position in their job. And so, even while we were planning and having these conversations, we also looked for opportunities that we can connect them to additional resources to support them on their trajectory on this ride.

And so, where we are with that work right now is, now that we have identified the strategies across six systems that we are looking to implement, we also know that we have to focus in place because it’s really about how are we stacking these resources in place. And so, we’ll be focused in two geographical areas of Memphis to really say, okay, can we understand and track 10,000 individuals on this pathway from cradle to career? Meaning from the time you’re born, as you transition into the K-12 system, as you transition to post-secondary workforce, can we make sure that the right supports are in place by stacking resources from private organizations, nonprofits, governmental agencies, local, state, and federal resources, grants to really say, “This is how we can really build a civic infrastructure of how we can work together”?

And so, through this work, it’s not just seeing a success leading, but really building that public-private table to help us govern this work. How are we ensuring that that table has representation from the community and youth that have been a part of the work, ensuring that we’re able to stabilize and have annual conversations with the public sector about what do their investments look like going into these communities, in terms of how do we ensure that residents have access to them? Because when we were doing the research, some of the main things they were talking about were the challenges of accessing resources, transportation, childcare, having emergency funds available for just the small needs and incidentals that come along the way. And so, we are being very intentional in terms of how we implement this work on the ground, in place, to ensure that we have many of those resources in place to help them on that trajectory and ensuring that we really have more of a warm handoff.

Because if you look at the data, it says we shift from different systems going from early childhood to K-12, going from K-12 to post-second workforce, that we really lose a lot of our individuals and our residents, and we don’t want to do that. And so, this is a way for us to really come together as a community to really understand, what are the challenges that we’re having? Here are the strategies that we are implementing collectively together. Here’s how we will work and govern ourselves. Here’s what we’re looking at as a common metrics to understand our progress and be accountable to one another so that ultimately we’re able to improve outcomes for kids and families with improving economic social mobility.

And just to frame a little bit of this for us, we use a lot of also Raj Chetty’s research. We’ve used a lot of research from the Federal Reserve to say, well, when we say economic social mobility, what does that mean for Memphis? And for us in looking at the data, there’s only about a 2.3% chance of a young black male going from the bottom quartile to the top. We want to make sure that this is not just over the next five years, but over the next generation, we’re building something that’s long-lasting. So that what took decades and hundreds of years to create, we know we’re not going to fix it overnight, but how are we laying a foundation and the infrastructure that’s needed to do this on a continuous basis? So regardless if I’m here or anyone else, the work will continue, the mission will continue, and there’s really a movement about how do we improve outcomes and continue Memphis as a whole on this trajectory to a better Memphis for tomorrow.

Sydney Diavua

One of the that really stands out to me is the sheer amount of work that you all have done. 10,000 individuals, that’s significant to be able to want to move them through this cradle to career. But it’s also, you said something important on, you thought it would take one year, and it took three. And I think that’s something to call out for those who are on the call. Chioke, Celeste, how did you all think about the time it would take to actually do this community-engaged research? Did you all encounter any surprises when it came to the timing it takes to do this work?

Celeste Frye

Yes, is the short answer, which I bet everyone would say. I do think it takes some careful and thoughtful planning. It takes time to build buy-in from the key stakeholders, whether that be the funders of the work or the key organizations that are involved. You have to build that buy-in, and then it takes some time to recruit community members to be involved, to train them, to have the conversations with them, to make sure that you’re being sensitive to cultural nuances. You may need to be providing information in several different languages and pay attention to accessibility. So you do have to conduct a little bit longer and more thoughtful process leading into it, which speaks to what Chioke was saying about getting funders to pay attention to that part, but you do just end up with so much richer information.

One key point, slightly off-topic, but that I wanted to make was that we often think of research as being quantitative and people really valuing data in terms of research. But I think it can be really powerful when you pair quantitative data with qualitative data, and you get these opportunities to tell stories about the real people who are part of this work in a way that you absolutely can’t when you’re just working from, say, surveys or large-scale census data or things like that.

Chioke Mose-Telesford

And the only other thing that I’ll add is that even small details, like how you give compensation, even researching the type of compensation, that looks very differently. For some communities, it makes sense to get a gift card from a local grocery store. For some folks, it might be a digital e-card that’s emailed to them. But again, that could be sliced and diced for the same project and the same community based on who you’re engaged with. And if you really want to meet people where they are, you have to honor that. And so, that’s something that I think a lot of people don’t think about. And I think the other thing is that, if you really want to try to engage with the unusual suspects, that takes even more time to find partners on the ground who you can bring along to the project, who might be trusted partners with that community or with that population so that they can get those folks to the table as well.

Sydney Diavua

So we’ve got lots of questions rolling in, and I want to encourage our audience to continue to submit questions. We’re going to try to get to them, as many as possible. I have one more for our panelists on the same topic. And it’s, what lessons have you learned from this type of work that can keep it from being extractive towards communities and towards those who are most vulnerable? And what have you learned, what have you done to keep this work from being extractive?

Jamilica Burke

One thing that I can talk about when it comes to this, and this is something that we have encountered and have been working through, is the idea of residents and youth being looked at as tokens or tokenism to check in a box and say, “Hey, I had them at the table for this one meeting.” And so, even though it was not perfect, but what we were very intentional around was, from the beginning all the way from the design to the planning to the implementation, we made sure those voices were at the table to inform not even just what the strategy would be, but how we would come together to even have the discussions around what we’re looking to do for our community.

Many things that has been brought up in terms of what is the right compensation, what do we look at as time commitment? What would be some of the experiences they would like to gain as they go through this process? Because again, to many of the points brought up, it wasn’t all just monetary. It also was access to opportunities when it comes to jobs and education, having opportunities to even attend some of the professional training and support. So we were actually able to take some of our individuals to some of our national conferences and have them speak about the work. So all of this was helping to also build their skill sets in other areas that they found to be very important.

And I would say another thing that we did to really work towards not having that perception, even though it has been a push and pull, is also just thinking about how we engage the public sector. Because when we think about administrators and elected officials, and we want to ensure that the voices of community are at the table as well is, how do we ensure that we’re presenting information to both in a way to where they have a deep understanding of it and commonality in terms of the language around it/ Because a large part of it was more of a language barrier. Less about, we don’t want to do this or we don’t think it’s important, but how do we present it in a way to where it’s important to them?

So we have found over the last three years especially that we have had to do significant focus on our communications about this work because there are multiple stakeholders at the table. There are different levels of experience and expertise that are coming together. But we also had to figure out, what’s the common foundational information that everyone needs to know, and then how do we tailor that to the different types of groups that will be a part of this? So those were a couple of things that we have to do to really think strategically about how we’re fighting that perception of being extractive.

Sydney Diavua

That’s helpful. And I hear you’re learning from the community, but at the same time, you’re building community. You’re building both the relationships between institutions, but also just opportunities for those who are living in community. I would love to keep talking with you all. Oh, Celeste, go ahead.

Celeste Frye

Oh, sorry. I just wanted to amen to everything Jamilica said. Absolutely right. One quick thing I would just add is that, so we were part of the Feds Worker Voices project, which I know is going to be talked about in just a moment. And those were some of the most rewarding conversations I think I have ever had because we had workers from around the country, and they recognized these were people who had worked with local workforce development organizations, whether it’s a Goodwill or a United Way, and they were so excited to get to be part of this policy conversation. They knew, coming out of the pandemic, the importance of having these conversations. And I think that was really, it was amazing to see folks recognize that and just be very proud of the fact that, yes, they were getting an incentive, and yes, they were getting some training and professional development, but yes, they were also contributing to what they knew was a really important conversation.

And then, last piece is just that it’s also crucially important to share what you learn back to your community, both the stakeholders who participated, but also the wider community because that’s how you continue to build that trust and build that community and not be extractive. You share back what you learn and the impacts that it might have.

Sydney Diavua

Thank you. And don’t go away, Celeste, because I have a question from the audience that I think you’re really well situated to answer. And so, this question is, have panelists had to balance community engagement goals with the research requirements from institutional review boards? How have you navigated guidance that may limit interactions with vulnerable populations?

Celeste Frye

Yeah, so one thing I would say is, don’t just assume if you’re doing research with people that you’re going to have to use an institutional review board, or an IRB. You may not. You may have them look at your research proposal, and they may say, “This isn’t necessary. IRB oversight isn’t necessary.”

But if you do, we work with an independent IRB based in the Midwest that works with more freelance, say, research, not just large institutions. And they were able to help guide us to establish a research plan that would conform to the requirements for research. In this particular instance, we were working with young people in a summer youth employment program actually in eight cities around the country. And so, because they were young adults under the age of 18, we wanted to be very careful, and we really actually found the IRB in this instance to be a good partner in terms of helping us to guide and shape the research so that everyone involved would be safe. So I would say, don’t assume you’re going to need IRB oversight, but if you do, don’t assume that it’s going to be a difficult experience. They may actually be able to be a big help to you.

Sydney Diavua

Thanks, Celeste. And so, I’m going to pose this to the group because this is an important question. I appreciate the comment about gaining the perspective of program participants when defining outcomes, but what if the desired outcomes of the participants and funders don’t align? What are the implications for program design and success metrics? So how have you all had to navigate a landscape where the desired outcomes from program participants may not align with those of funders?

Chioke Mose-Telesford

Yeah, and that’s actually something that we’re really talking about now. We just wrapped up the work. And so, our goal is really to share it around and call that question out. What would it look like if workforce programs were designed to ensure their job seekers, their folks that they’re working with feel a sense of safety and belonging on the job that they’re at? What would that do for job quality of the places that folks are being placed at? What would that look like for people’s economic mobility long term? And so, that’s what we’re talking with a lot of funders about and also workforce organizations, some who are already starting to incorporate some new measures, more holistic measures into how they, on their own, are really evaluating themselves. But yeah, that’s a great question because I think that you design for what you are intended outcome is, and so flipping the intended outcome, I think, would make programs look a little different.

Sydney Diavua

I want to see if I can get to another question. And Jamilica, I saw you came off mute, so if you want to answer this one, and I’ve got another one for you.

Jamilica Burke

Yeah, just real quick, the one thing that I would add to that when there’s misalignment in terms of data, but I would also just say in goal setting, what we’ve been working very intentionally to do is also have funders at the table to be a part of some of those conversations. But also, ultimately what we work towards, and we made this clear from day one, is that as part of this end result, we have to have a standard metrics and a standard accountability system in terms of how we work together. And that is not just in word, but also in agreements. And so, we have operating agreements between our major partners, partnership agreements with organizations and entities that are executing the work so that it is very clear on the front end what the expectation is, what data, what goals and outcomes that we’re working towards to ensure that we have that alignment.

And also, as a part of that, has been working with our funding community to also think more strategically about, well, what does it look like to have even one report that really exemplifies all of this information that goes to everyone? Because we also want to help organizations not have to do 12 different reports for 12 different funders as they do this work as well. So really trying to figure out what is the win-win for both as we move towards more of the execution of the plan.

Sydney Diavua

So one last question, and Jamilica, I’m going to start the round with you. But in 30 seconds to each of you all, what parting advice would you leave for someone who’s starting their journey with community-engaged research?

Jamilica Burke

One thing that I already mentioned is, however much time you think it’s going to take, it typically takes more time than that. So keeping that in mind as you get into the planning and being flexible and nimble and being okay to say that, “You know what? We started this. We thought we were taking this pathway. It’s really not working, and we need to readjust.” It’s okay to readjust because the ultimate goal is, do we have something meaningful that is you’re going to be impactful to ultimately the individuals that we’re looking to support in this work?

Sydney Diavua

Thanks. Celeste, what about you? What parting advice?

Celeste Frye

To what Jamilica said, I would add, be collaborative and really listen actively to the community that you’re working with. One very specific way of doing that is, with these focus groups for Young Summer Youth Employment Program participants, we actually did a test focus group. We had almost a little planning committee of some of the participants who helped us refine our questions so that we were using plain language and vocabulary that would resonate with 15 to 17 year olds, for example. So we were very collaborative in how we set up the work, and we really listened to the people.

Sydney Diavua

Thank you. Chioke, in 30 seconds, what would be your parting advice?

Chioke Mose-Telesford

Both of what they said. And also, make sure you actually have a plan to incorporate what you learn into your work. Don’t just do it. You have to have the capacity and the time and the plan to really make sure you’re taking what you learned and actually applying it.

Sydney Diavua

Thank you. So I want to thank you all as our panelists for your insights and your advice on how to deepen this body of work. I’d now like to invite my Federal Reserve colleagues, Sarah Miller and Ashley Putnam, to come on screen and share updates from the Worker Voices project.

Ashley Putnam

Thank you, Sydney. And first, let me just start by saying thank you to such an excellent panel. We really appreciated your insights. I really truly wish we could have had you all as advisors when we were putting together some of the work that Sarah and I have done here. So by means of introduction, I’m Ashley Putnam. I’m at the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia, and I was honored to be a co-leader of a project you’ve heard mentioned a couple of times today, the Worker Voices Project.

And I really just want to reflect how impressed I am by the conversation we just had. The kinds of communities you’re working with, from third graders and fifth graders, to childcare providers, to justice involved individuals, low- and moderate-income communities, workers, I really think you cover a breadth of work. And when we set out to do this work, we were really interested in trying to understand some of the questions we’ve addressed here. How are people faring in the labor market, particularly after the pandemic? And we have this kind of novel idea that maybe we could ask them. And to be fair, it has been a journey for us.

And so, I want to start by honoring what we saw in the polling question, which is that many of you are in different places on this journey. Some of you are just getting started, some of you are planning, some of you are starting to conduct this research. And I would say that at the Federal Reserve, we too are on this journey. And for us, it has really been a learning journey as a System, and we’ve really gleaned some important lessons from that. And honestly, quite a few of them are aligned with what you just heard about telling stories about real people and why it’s impactful to help our quantitative data, about things taking a little more time than we had planned them to, or the importance of piloting and testing with focus groups to make sure our language is clear.

So we are going to be pulling together some of those lessons that we’ve learned in a toolkit that we will be coming out with in the next month or so. And so, we hope you will stay tuned to hear about our learnings and where we are in these lessons, and we also hope you’ll continue to be a part of this community that is learning and growing together. Sarah?

Sarah Miller

Yeah, thanks Ashley. And again, thank you to our excellent panelists. We are learning right along with you and learn through the work that we did. And as Paula mentioned at the top of the call, it is our objective to do research that empowers versus extracts, but it’s definitely a learning journey for us. And using the research that we did around a very specific kind of case of research, the toolkit that will be forthcoming next month, we hope gives you some really good guidance on what you can consider from what we did and what we learned throughout this process.

A lot of the steps that we’ll cover were covered in all of the work that we talked about today. But really, this is going to get into, what did we learn from even scoping the project, how we set our research goals, how we chose the methods that we were using for engaging with the workers and learners, how we tested those methods, how we tested the questions, how we tried to build trust not just with the research participants, but also with our community partners, and really get to that core exchanging value, making sure that we’re not being extractive and that there is a purpose for these questions and that we are kind of utilizing this in our work and moving forward.

So I hope that the conversation today really offered some phenomenal food for thought. We saw that folks were kind of across the spectrum in terms of their journey, and I learned a lot. The constantly challenge assumptions is something that’s absolutely at the top of our brains here at the Fed all of the time, and I appreciate that reinforcement from the experts that we had on the call.

So with that, Sydney, I’ll turn it back to you, but we look forward to sharing the toolkit with you in the coming weeks and continuing the good work with all the folks we have on the call and all those that were able to join us today. So thank you for joining us.

Sydney Diavua

Thank you, Sarah. Thank you, Ashley. And thank you to our speakers for providing insightful information and engaging our audience. And attendees, thank you for spending your valuable time with us today. But before we end the session, we do have a few requests. Please complete the survey. We’ll send it to you immediately after today’s event so that we can improve and continue to bring you timely and relevant topics.

Today’s session will also be available on YouTube and the Connecting Communities page in about two weeks. Please visit Fed Communities at fedcommunities.org to access additional articles, resources, and data about community development across the Federal Reserve. Follow us on social media. We’re on LinkedIn, X, Instagram, and Facebook. And don’t forget to subscribe to the Fed Communities newsletter by clicking the About Us tab and then click subscribe.

This session, including the slides, will be available and featured in our next newsletter and will be available on our website within two weeks of today’s event. Finally, check out recordings of previous Connecting Communities webinars on fedcommunities.org. Also check back periodically for more Connecting Communities events. Our next event will be held on September 5, 2024 at 3:00 to 4:00 PM Eastern, on the Economic Insights from Lower-Income Communities, Findings From the 2024 Community Perspective Survey. Thank you again for joining Connecting Communities, and we hope to see you soon.