Cape Town

Community-Based Partnership Research

 

The Cape Town program encourages students to engage with South African communities by responding to their information needs through community-based research. Here too we take a partnership approach with the intention of developing relationships with organizations - Western Cape NGOs, government agencies, residents associations, or other community-based organizations or groups - that can sustain long-term inquiry projects that students contribute to each program year. These projects should build new knowledge and skills for students, respond effectively to community health and development information needs of Centre partners, and ultimately contribute to improved life for Western Cape residents. Although students may choose the focus of their research, it must respond to information needs expressed by Western Cape communities or groups and be endorsed by one or more of the program’s partner organizations.  Students wishing to research with organizations that are not BOSP centre partners must obtain permission from the Cape Town program director.

 

We require that students commit to at least TWO QUARTERS of research activity in Cape Town – either Winter and Spring quarters or Spring and Summer.  Students starting Winter Quarter take a preparation seminar (OSPCPTWN 024A) that introduces them to methods and approaches to community-based-partnership research (CBPR) and supports their development of a feasible research plan with one of our partners, which they carry out Spring Quarter though the programme’s research seminar (OSPCPTWN 024B). Students committing to Spring/Summer take the preparation seminar (OSPCPTWN 022) in the Spring and work independently over the summer on their projects. Research projects for Winter or Spring Quarters only are not likely to be approved.

 

Summer research fellowship support may be available through the Center for African Studies and/or Undergraduate Academic Research (UAR). For information on the 2012 fellows and their projects, please visit the Cape Town Summer Fellows page.

Community research projects and partners 2010 - 2012 include:

• The impacts of an indigenous intervention method to protect children from family violence in the Riebeeksrivier Valley – in collaboration with Goedgedacht
• Mapping, negotiating, and monitoring of a biodiversity corridor from the Kasteelberg to the Pardeberg Mountains – in collaboration with Goedgedacht
• South Africa's National Health Insurance Scheme: Impacts on Female Agricultural Workers' Access to Health Care – Women on Farms, Learning Network for Health and Human Rights
• Monitoring and evaluating the impact of a Social Development Fund – in collaboration with the Violence Prevention and Urban Upgrading (VPUU) project, City of Cape Town
• Teacher Allocation in Post-Apartheid South Africa – in collaboration with Equal Education
• Community perceptions of juvenile crime and restorative justice in Cape Town: Implications for the Child Justice Act of 2008 – in collaboration with Young in Prison
• Accelerating Good Business: Providing a Platform to Grow Micro-Franchise Business - in collaboration with The Clothing Bank
• Investigating Determinants of Fruit and Vegetable Consumption for Children in Khayelitsha, South Africa" – in collaboration with Philani Child and Nutrition Project
• The Criminal Economy of Education: Understanding Dropout in Lavender Hill – in collaboration with Extra-Mural Education Project (EMEP).