Leveraging faculty research in partnership with South Bend

August 22, 2024

Regina Williams-Preston was able to combine her passions for education, justice, and the city of South Bend when she joined the Institute for Social Concerns earlier this year.

As the center’s community partnerships program director, the longtime South Bend public schools teacher and community leader was presented with an opportunity to connect Notre Dame and South Bend in ways that will foster new collaborations between campus and the community.

This fall, she’s hitting the ground running with a variety of programs.

Her focus will be on leveraging faculty research in collaboration with community partners to advance the common good and respond to local issues. This work is core to the Institute for Social Concerns’ mission and also aligns with Notre Dame’s new strategic framework, which places a priority on expanding and building upon genuine partnerships with South Bend.

Williams-Preston’s plans include taking faculty into South Bend to familiarize them with the city, bringing faculty and community partners together to apply their expertise to specific problems, and facilitating opportunities for students to get involved in the community in meaningful ways.

“All of these things serve the same purpose — putting Notre Dame’s faculty expertise to work in partnership with the community to make South Bend a place where all people can live their best lives,” she said. “A big part of this work will be having conversations with community partners and hearing what the needs are, bringing people together, and breaking down silos.”

One of the opportunities will be a South Bend bus tour for faculty interested in research and teaching in collaboration with the community. The tour is scheduled for noon to 3 p.m. on Friday, September 27, and will include boxed lunches.

“The tour is about reintroducing Notre Dame to South Bend — the unique places and history and beautiful people,” she said. “The goal is to help faculty understand the depth and breadth of the diversity, complexity, and opportunities in the city.”

Another initiative will be a bimonthly series of issue workshops that will invite faculty and community experts to come together around a particular question of justice. The first workshop on Friday, September 20, will focus on housing and specifically how to encourage development without displacement. The main question, Williams-Preston said, is how neighborhoods can be revitalized without pushing out existing residents. Later workshops will focus on topics such as violence, food, and education.

“The value of these workshops will be in convening multiple voices in the same room, bringing together people with different perspectives and inviting them to put all their wisdom on the table,” Williams-Preston said. “It’s exciting because combining expertise from the community with expertise from campus could help us understand these issues better and make a real, tangible difference in people’s lives in South Bend.”

On the evening of October 7, the Institute for Social Concerns will host a Community Partners Fair in Geddes Hall. Local nonprofit organizations will set up information tables throughout the building, and representatives from those organizations will be on hand for conversations with Notre Dame faculty, staff, and students who are interested in being more involved in the community.

Williams-Preston’s other efforts will include engaging with neighborhood associations and networking with Saint Mary’s College, Holy Cross College, and Indiana University South Bend faculty who are working in the community.

“We want to create a rhythm of engagement so the things we’re doing are on a regular basis,” she said. “We want to be in South Bend in a way that’s predictable and consistent.”

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