Community Engaged Research Training Curriculum for Lay Researchers

Posted by on September 16, 2013

Camp Boot: Community Engaged Research Training Curriculum for Lay Researchers

Camp Boot is designed to teach community residents the principles of community based participatory research. The purpose is to prepare community residents as lay researchers with the capacity to partner with academic and/or community-based researchers to co-design and co-implement health-related studies. The title, Camp Boot, is intentional. “Boot Camp” is usually based on a command and control, top down philosophy. Camp Boot intends to reverse that philosophy in its teaching approach, drawing on practices of Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA), Rapid Rural Appraisal (RRA), Community-Based Participatory Research (CBPR) and similar approaches (1-3). Adapted from the Partners in Research: Community and Faculty Training Curricula to Prepare Partners for Community-based Participatory Research Collaborations (4), Camp Boot includes more quantitative information. Camp Boot was developed and piloted in collaboration with a group of 40 African American and Hispanic residents representing medically underserved areas in Houston and Galveston neighborhoods (approximately 50% from each area). Participants were recruited by the advisory board (see question 7). Participants were paid a stipend of $600 for completing the 5 day, 40 hour training. Though our focus for the pilot project was with underserved populations, the curriculum is appropriate for a general audience of community residents interested in learning more about the basics of research, including non-geographically based communities and who have a desire to partner with academic researchers on CBPR projects. While the pilot implementation focused on training community residents, the curriculum could also be used for training and preparing community based organizations to integrate a research component into their programming.

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