Swearer Center for Public Service

Policies and Guidance

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Policies and Guidance

This page highlights applicable University policies and provides guidance on various issues important in community engagement (e.g., collaboration agreements, work with minors, compensation of partners, transportation and more).

Depending on the nature of your community engagement, you may need to take prior action. See below for further details and contact information. For general consultations, contact Julie Plaut at the Swearer Center or Sarah Bouchard in the School of Public Health.

Collaboration Agreements

If you engage with a community organization as part of your course, research, outreach or other collaborative efforts, you may be required by the University to enter into a collaboration agreement.

Written agreements support collaborative relationships, trust and accountability by clarifying goals and expectations and protecting the interests of faculty and students, as well as the University and the community collaborator. Given intellectual property (IP) rights and the University’s Copyright Ownership and Use Policy and Patent and Invention Policy, agreements are especially important for collaborative research and for courses in which community collaborators may want to use student coursework or other materials resulting from the course.

Creating a shared record of your plans for collaboration can prevent misunderstandings and challenges by addressing roles and responsibilities, intended deliverables and other key issues. Resources that may help you think about developing agreements include:

Please note that none of these template or sample documents are endorsed or used by Brown University, and they should not be used for Brown business or coursework without going through Brown’s processes related to agreements and contracts. Research Agreements and Contracting (RAC) staff in OVPR are responsible for drafting, negotiating, managing, and executing agreements and contracts which support research at Brown, including material transfer agreements, data use agreements, unfunded or internally funded agreements, and other complex and unique contracts which do not fall within the purview of the offices of Sponsored Projects or Brown Technology Innovation.

 

Brown's Copyright Ownership and Use Policy describes the rights students have in works they create in the course of their education. When a student engages with a third-party through and as part of the curriculum of a course, the rights to and use of information provided to Brown and the students and of work created as a result of that engagement must be reviewed and considered carefully. 

For instructors of courses in which students’ assignments include work (e.g., data, analysis, reports, presentations, materials) that will be graded and will also be provided to a third-party for its use and benefit, Brown University has:

  • a template agreement for instructors to provide to both engaged students and community organization representatives for signature, and
  • the following statement for instructors to include in the course syllabus.

Under Brown University's Copyright Ownership and Use Policy, works created by students in the course of their education are owned by the individual student, subject to Brown’s license to use that work for educational or research purposes. In this Community-Based Learning and Research course, students complete projects informed by - and intended to benefit - nonprofit or public agencies, which will need permission to use, and potentially have ownership rights in, the work you create. By taking this course and engaging in a collaborative project, you indicate your willingness to grant this permission; the instructor will facilitate the appropriate agreement with the nonprofit or public agency.  Your willingness to grant this permission will not affect your ability to use the course work for educational purposes.

If you would not like to grant permission to a community partner organization to use your work, you must inform the instructor before Week 3 of this course, and s/he/they will make arrangements for you to complete a separate project that fulfills course requirements. 

The syllabus statement and signed agreements are not necessary for engaged courses in which students learn from community-based experts and/or complete assignments on community issues in support of a community organization’s mission but do not produce work with partner organizations for the organizations’ use. Instructors who would like support around collaboration agreements are encouraged to contact Julie Plaut, Director of Engaged Scholarship in the Swearer Center or, for those in the School of Public Health, Sarah Bouchard, Community Engagement Director in SPH.

Work with Minors or Vulnerable Populations

Brown University has launched a Minors Protection Program that directs centralized requirements for Minors Activities, whether they are conducted in-person or virtually. The main requirements include: 

For more information, see https://mp.brown.edu/. 

As you develop a collaboration, also ask your community collaborator(s) for information on what, if any, clearances, certifications and/or training they require. Individuals engaging with organizations that work with minors or vulnerable populations may be required to complete a background check before they begin their engagement. 

The Swearer Center can provide logistical and financial support for background checks for students in Community-Based Learning and Research (CBLR)-designated courses during the early weeks of each semester. 

  • If you would like this support for a course you're teaching, please email Julie Plaut.
  • If you are interested in accessing a more complete explanation of how the Swearer Center runs a background check process that you can replicate, please email swearer-operations@brown.edu.

Rhode Island law also requires reporting known or suspected cases of child abuse and/or neglect to the Department of Children, Youth and Families within 24 hours of becoming aware of such abuse/neglect. The Swearer Center has produced an asynchronous Mandatory Reporter Training module that is accessible to anyone at Brown through Top Hat.

Additional Resources 

Human Subjects Research and IRB Approval

If your research involves human subjects or their potentially-identifiable information, you may need Institutional Review Board (IRB) approval before any research activities can begin. Research activities include accessing, viewing, or receiving any potentially identifiable information about or from living people. 

The Human Research Protection Program (HRPP) in OVPR is responsible for safeguarding and promoting the health and welfare of human research participants by ensuring that their rights, safety and well-being are protected. 

For assistance determining if a project needs IRB review:

Data Confidentiality, Sharing and Use

Data used as part of campus-community collaborations may be subject to institutional policies or privacy laws, such as the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA), which addresses student data, and the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), which addresses Protected Health Information. If your work with a community collaborator will involve sharing data–either Brown sharing data with the collaborator or the collaborator sharing data with Brown–please work with the relevant University units on the necessary approvals, agreements, and protections are in place.

Compensation of Community Collaborators

The Office of Community Engagement and the Swearer Center encourage the compensation of community-based collaborators as co-teachers and co-researchers. The Swearer Center, for example, offers CBLR Course Mini-Grants that instructors can request to pay to individuals or organizations at a maximum rate of $100/hour, and Engaged Research Mini-Grants that students can request to pay community collaborators. 

Paying individuals and organizations external to Brown is possible after they register as a university supplier. If you are considering providing gift cards rather than payments, see Brown's gift card policy. Gift Card purchases must be pre-approved in writing by your unit’s P-card Administrator.

The University may also recognize community collaborators' capacity in other ways (e.g., as a Professor of the Practice, if appropriate and approved by the cognizant Dean). Some engaged research initiatives hire community members into paid positions. As you develop relationships with potential community collaborators, ask whether your collaborators would value training or in-kind support, such as access to campus spaces, technology, or grant writing assistance, so Brown can consider opportunities to support such training or support. If they are interested in opportunities you cannot address but others at Brown might, please fill out this form or email engage@brown.edu.

Liability Waivers and Transportation for Off-Campus Activities

The Assumption of Risk and Release Agreement (template from the University’s Office of the General Counsel) for students participating in voluntary field trips/off-campus experiences is appropriate for use in one-time off-campus engagement experiences. Faculty or staff should collect signed forms in digital or hard copy and retain them for four (4) years following the conclusion of the program. Waivers are generally not required for off-campus experiences that are a required component of a course – or required activities by an employee.

Institutional guidance on transportation associated with academic field trips is also relevant to required or voluntary course-related activities off campus, but students engaged in ways that entail multiple off-campus activities may also be expected to take RIPTA (accessible free with a Brown ID), walk or take shuttles when those are reasonable options. Units that want to cover participants’ shared rides between the University and a community site can request a departmental Lyft Concierge account. The University’s Insurance Office does not manage transportation arrangements but can help review particular situations and make recommendations about managing the risks associated with a program or a specific travel situation. Group travel policies and guidance can be found in Brown’s travel policy.

University Policies

Visit the university policy site to search and view additional university policies.