Questions?
Please review the information below. With remaining questions, please contact communityresilience@uci.edu for assistance.
Materiales en Español?
Si quiere recibir estos materiales en español, contacte communityresilience@uci.edu. El equipo del proyecto CAPECA es bilingüe en inglés y español.
What is CAPECA?
CAPECA is a 15-month training program for placed-based teams of community members and researchers in California to work together for a just and survivable future.
Community-Academic Partnerships to Advance Equity-Focused Climate Action is a pilot that aims to augment the training of up to 12 Californian place-based teams of community leaders and university researchers from the UC and CSU who work together to ask and answer key research questions that inform climate planning and action in their place. We call the project CAPECA for short.
CAPECA harnesses a team of popular education-based curriculum designers and facilitators who train and walk alongside climate vulnerable low-income communities and communities of color throughout California to support community-driven climate resilience planning. The training is rooted in the principles and practices of participatory action research, popular education, and social equity.
CAPECA goals include:
Honoring existing expertise and building capacity of community-based leaders who are rooted in impacted communities that are directly affected by local, city, or municipal climate planning;
Connecting community-driven climate justice and resilience efforts with university researchers and students, and strengthening those partnerships;
Supporting community-based facilitators and organizers to learn and co-create together with UC and CSU students and faculty various methods to establish community-driven analysis, strategies, and knowledge that enable community members to participate meaningfully as leaders and not as token community representatives in research project design and throughout project execution;
Surfacing and giving voice to the priorities, visions, goals and strategies of impacted communities as they relate to equity-focused climate action; and
Supporting the UC and CSU students, faculty and community leaders to expand what issues are included in “climate” and “climate justice” research and action, who gets to participate, and how.
Desired Outcomes:
CAPECA aims to enable:
Up to 12 place-based community-academic partnerships in California with
team-developed principles for collaboration and
tools and preparation to
Co-create local, equity-focused, community-driven participatory action research processes for climate action (i.e., tools and preparation for collaborative research design, data collection, analysis, and action strategy); and
Pursue relevant equity-focused state and federal climate action research funding opportunities;
A learning community of UC and CSU faculty and students trained in CAPECA research methodologies;
Preparation and identification of a sub-cohort of community leaders, faculty, and advanced students eligible for subsequent TBD CAPECA trainers’ training to promulgate CAPECA’s approach among additional colleagues and students in subsequent climate research contexts; and
A training manual and roadmap for CAPECA training replication, highlighting stories of transformation, best practices, and lessons learned for rapid dissemination through relevant channels across the state.
CAPECA is sponsored by the University of California's Carbon Neutrality Initiative through the UC President’s Global Climate Leadership Council.
Communities across California increasingly experience the impacts of the climate crisis. In response, cities, counties, and universities are accelerating the development and revision of climate and climate resilience action plans. However, too often these processes leave out the vital knowledge, priorities, visions, and leadership of the people who bear the brunt of climate impacts locally, and who often know the most about what is needed. "Key to closing equity gaps and resolving climate vulnerability is direct participation by impacted communities in the development and implementation of solutions and policy decisions that directly impact them. This level of participation can unleash much needed capacity, but also requires initial capacity investments across multiple sectors to strengthen our local democracies through systems changes and culture shifts."*
While excellent training resources focused on such shifts already exist in community-based settings, there is a need for additional and comparable state-wide training resources to support community-based organizations in climate-impacted communities across California to partner effectively with universities. When effective, such partnerships can advance the research needed to support communities in galvanizing action for relevant climate solutions. CAPECA aims to help fill this gap.
CAPECA bridges between community and academic partners by drawing upon frameworks and tools from various community-based training settings (including Facilitating Power's Spectrum of Community Engagement to Ownership*; Vision Power Solutions; and the Coliberate participatory action research curriculum from Partners for Collaborative Change). This bridge is buttressed by alignment with university-based capacity building initiatives (including the UC-wide Student Leadership Institute for Climate Resilience and the UC-wide DEIJ-focused Climate Resilience Planning Framework) and with various national and state entities that innovate in this space (including National Association of Climate Resilience Planners, California Governor's Office of Planning and Research, Climate Innovation, Full Spectrum Capital Partners, and the University of California's Center for Climate Justice).
CAPECA works with place-based teams in California. CAPECA invited teams composed of representatives from the community (leaders or staff in community groups, organizations, or hubs), facilitators or intermediaries that work within the community, and lastly, university-based researchers or facilitators from UC and CSU campuses. We welcome participation from already formed community-academic partnerships as well as those in beginning and formative stages. We also welcome inquiries from individuals who are open to building relationships towards a potential place-based community-academic partnership. Check out the following criteria.
This training is for you if you…
Work within one or more community-based group/organization/hub rooted in a community with limited resources and experiencing direct climate impacts AND you
Realize that you have a role to play in climate planning so that your community is not left behind (climate planning can include, e.g., issues of housing, food access, land use, health, water);
Your community has opportunities for grassroots equity and justice work that could be parallel, in resistance, or connected to city planning;
Have the ability to anchor your community as a leader/facilitator who can be held accountable; and
You have a positive track record in your community.
Work as a facilitator or intermediary for an organization that supports community-based entities that fit the criteria above AND you
Have relevant skills;
Are open to self-reflection and learning; and
Utilize an equity lens in your work, particularly in analysis.
Work as a university-based researcher or facilitator (note: students are eligible but must be partnered with a faculty or post-doctoral scholar mentor) AND you
Have relevant skills;
Are open to self-reflection and learning;
Utilize an equity lens in your work, particularly in analysis (note: if you have low equity experience, you must partner with someone with greater experience);
Have a demonstrated commitment to collaborate on a community-driven research project;
Are available for the entire project (through December 2023);
Are affiliated with a University of California or California State University campus; and
Can receive the academic credit or job requirements you may seek without needing particular research or publication outcomes.
Timeline & Milestones
CAPECA began in October 2022 and lasts through December 2023, with the option of continuing CAPECA accompaniment through June 2024. Notable dates include:
Cohort Applications Initial Deadline: June 1, 2022
Information Session for Community Members (virtual): Friday, June 17, 2022, from 10:00 am - 12:00 pm
Year-long Cohort Applications Final Deadline: August 1, 2022
Cohort Kickoff Workshop & Training (2 full days, in person in the Bay Area): Arrive evening of October 7, training October 8 and 9, 2022 (ending by 3 pm October 9).
Cohort trainings on participatory action research methods and community-driven climate resilience planning and action (virtual and in person): October 2022 - December 2023
Two additional 2-day in person trainings in Summer and December 2023
Coaching and site visits with CAPECA trainers (virtual and in person): January - December 2023
And more!
CAPECA Cohort
After the Introductory Workshop, CAPECA sought applications from place-based teams to become part of the 15-month CAPECA cohort. While a place-based team may be as large as the team needs it to be, for the purposes of CAPECA, we asked teams to identify a mix of up to five community-based and academic members to commit to participating in CAPECA activities on behalf of their team throughout the training (please review the participation criteria in the "Who?" section above). For certain online CAPECA workshops, it may be possible for more team members to participate beyond the designated five.
By October 2022, we began working with 12 place-based teams for the 15-month training series. CAPECA provides up to $6,000 per place-based team to help support community member participation in CAPECA activities.
Spanish language translation and interpretation are available. Tradicción e interpretación en español disponibles. For all other languages, please contact the CAPECA Project Team.
Introductory Workshop
CAPECA launched with a two-hour virtual Introductory Workshop by Zoom in February 2022. Through this participatory workshop, the CAPECA team engaged participants to elicit core principles of equitable community-university collaboration and set the stage for more. Check it out to learn more about CAPECA. Please find the recording, slides, and other materials here:
Resources Shared by Peers at the Introductory Workshop
Best practices for meaningful engagement outlined here https://www.epa.gov/sites/default/files/2016-08/documents/nepa_promising_practices_document_2016.pdf
See Vandana Shiva’s new book talking about philanthro capitalism as terrorism.
Decolonizing Wealth, by Edgar Villanueva.
This list of ‘principles and protocols’ for ethical research that a group of scholars developed
Collaborators
CAPECA Project Team: The team that designs and facilitates the CAPECA curriculum. Composed of popular education and participatory action research trainers, learning and evaluation faculty, and faculty and staff affiliates.
CAPECA Project Support Team: The team that supports the CAPECA Project Team to execute the CAPECA curriculum. Composed of experts in the areas of participatory action research, language justice, project management, and equity-focused climate innovation.
CAPECA Advisory Team: The team that helps to ensure alignment between CAPECA goals and process in the context of broader climate and climate justice aims. Composed of community, state, social movement, and academic leaders.
CAPECA Project Sponsors: The institutions that provide sponsorship and in kind support to enable CAPECA collaborators to work together.
CAPECA Project Team
Adriana Aldana, Associate Professor, Department of Social Work, CSU Dominguez Hills
Rosa Gonzalez, Principal, Facilitating Power; Visiting Community Scholar, UC Irvine Community Resilience (co-creator of NACRP framework and Vision, Power, Solutions curriculum)
Alana LeBron, Assistant Professor, Public Health and Chicano/Latino Studies, UC Irvine
Abby Reyes, Director, UC Irvine Community Resilience
Levana Saxon, co-founder, Partners for Collaborative Change (co-creator of Coliberate curriculum)
Aryeh Shell, Principal, Thrive Consulting; Lead Training Partner, UC Irvine Community Resilience (co-creator of SLICR curriculum and UC DEIJ-focused Climate Resilience Planning Framework)
Reach the CAPECA Project Team at communityresilience@uci.edu.
CAPECA Project Support Team
Bernadette Austin, UC Davis Center for Regional Change (CAPECA Coach)
Lluvia Cardenas, Guani Tenoli Interpreting and Translation (Language Justice Support)
Melody Gonzalez, Guani Tenoli Interpreting and Translation (Language Justice Lead)
Esme Hic, People's Climate Innovation Center (Project Management Support)
Brandon Louie, UC Davis Center for Regional Change (CAPECA Coach)
Alyssa Nelson, UC Davis Center for Regional Change (CAPECA Coach)
CAPECA Advisory Team
Adriana Aldana, Associate Professor, Department of Social Work, CSU Dominguez Hills
Eric Chu, Assistant Professor, Community & Regional Development, Department of Human Ecology; Co-director, Climate Adaptation Research Center, UC Davis
Taj James, Co-founder, Full Spectrum Capital Partners
Neil Matouka, Program Manager, Fifth Climate Change Assessment, CA Governor's Office of Planning and Research
Fatima T. Malik, Founder and Lead Organizer, Del Paso Heights Growers' Alliance; 2021-22 Partners Advancing Climate Equity (PACE) Leader
Colin Miller, Senior Associate, Environmental / Justice Solutions
Matthew St. Clair, Chief Sustainability Officer, UC Office of the President
Antonio Roman-Alcala, Assistant Professor, Department of Anthropology, Geography, and Environmental Studies, CSU East Bay
Project Sponsors
UCI Carbon Neutrality Initiative: Advising the UC on achieving carbon neutrality by 2025 while also providing guidance for furthering other longstanding sustainability goals.
UCI Community Resilience: Based at the University of California, Irvine (UCI), Community Resilience is a unit within the UCI Office of Sustainability. Community Resilience brings together teams of faculty, students, staff, and community collaborators to address environmental, health, and social justice challenges by fostering community-driven and equity-focused solutions.