The most compelling stories
are told with data

Collaboratory is a one-of-a-kind software that helps higher education understand the landscape of their engagement – the who, what, where, when and why of activities designed with and for their community.

Community engagement is a strategy through which higher education achieves its missions and goals.

Institutions must demonstrate how they are fulfilling their missions while aligning efforts to address key community priorities – now more than ever. In Collaboratory, the specific details of community-university activities are connected to a network of affiliated community partners, units on campus, courses, and institutional programs and initiatives.

The resulting data enables practitioners and scholars to increase buy-in and understanding for community engagement and public service, advocate for its recognition in promotion and tenure policies, and demonstrate the value and impacts of their partnerships.

What is Collaboratory?

Institutions committed to being community-engaged are presented with the challenge of tracking community engagement for reports, for applications or accreditations, and to build best and impactful practice. Learn how Collaboratory can help your institution’s community engagement efforts.

From individual interactions
to collective agendas

Often times, engagement and service is driven by individualized efforts of passionate faculty and staff from across the institution. Projects ebb and flow over time, as interests and capacity shift. Collaboratory helps capture these seemingly isolated activities and organize them into a framework for reporting, storytelling, and community-level change.

Created for Higher Education, by Higher Education

Collaboratory was developed in collaboration with UNC Greensboro. UNCG’s Institute for Community and Economic Engagement created an online database to organize and report their data from hundreds of community engagement and public service activities and relationships. Collaboratory builds off of UNCG’s experience and creates a national database to further understanding of the practice and scholarship of community engagement.

Focus on building culture,
not on learning software

Software is not a silver bullet for success. Our Community of Practice goes beyond technical assistance – we provide you with the connections and conversations you need to help you cultivate and grow the community-engaged work your institution is doing.

“We created the Collaboratory, initially, because of an institutional need to tell our story better and to collaborate more easily. In the process of using it, we discovered that we had the opportunity to establish a platform that, when used widely, can advance practice, administrative understanding, and outcomes of community engagement and public service.”

Emily Janke, Ph.D.Director, Institute for Community & Economic Engagement, UNC Greensboro

"Collaboratory enables us to systematically track engagement in ways that align with our strategic plan and analyze information to advocate for institutional change, develop strategic and sustainable partnerships, and tell a story of how we are working in collaboration to address societal issues and contribute to a thriving community."

Kristin Norris, Ph.DAssociate Director, Office of School Partnerships, Indiana University System

"Having data available about what you’ve done—how many hours, how many students, how many places, with what measures—that’s all critical. How it’s assessed both within the community and on campus and how it’s used to inform the deployment of our resources is very powerful. Collaboratory is a tool that I find can be very helpful.”

Richard Guarasci, Ph.D.President, Wagner College

"A robust repository that allows us to track and share our ongoing, collaborative initiatives helps to connect students, staff and faculty in community endeavors and to be mindful and respectful of existing community partnerships when developing new ones. We expect this to help in our efforts to attract students, faculty and staff who are committed to making a difference, connect and convene researchers across disciplines, and collaborate with community partners to address community-identified priorities for shared benefits."

Terri Shelton, Ph.D.Vice Chancellor for Research and Engagement, UNC Greensboro

"We are gaining a full appreciation of the power of Collaboratory to bring people onboard with making community engagement a priority at our institution. When you implement, be prepared to focus not just on the software as a tool, but also your strategy for how Collaboratory can help advance your conversation around community engagement. You will see so many benefits!"

Ellen Szarleta, Ph.D.Director, Center for Urban and Regional Excellence, Indiana University Northwest