University of Illinois at Chicago, School of Public Health Collaboratory for Health Justice

The University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) is Chicago’s only public research university, with 30,000 students, 15 colleges, a hospital, and a health sciences system. The UIC School of Public Health hosts the Collaboratory for Health Justice, which supports academic-community partnerships and community engagement. With this award, the Collaboratory supports a series of conversations to produce oral histories of structural violence and healing in the Little Village neighborhood of Chicago.

The University of Illinois Chicago (UIC) School of Public Health Collaboratory for Health Justice is dedicated to enhancing reciprocal engagement between the community and UIC faculty, students, and staff. The center strives to advance health justice by supporting academic-community partnerships that center the needs of communities, are based on meaningful participation of broad stakeholders, foster representation and presence in academic settings, and provide training and technical assistance for integrating community engagement across research, teaching and practice. With this award, the Collaboratory for Health Justice is implementing two projects: turning a community-based COVID-19 contact tracing effort into a network of community-based organizations across Chicago that provide and receive technical assistance to strengthen their organizations and a summer youth training program that introduces Chicagoans to public health. Both projects contribute to strengthening Chicago’s public health infrastructure to respond to COVID-19 pandemic as well as ongoing and future public health challenges.