Town+Gown

Action Research

Town+Gown’s systemic action research program uses service (experiential) learning and faculty-directed research to facilitate partnerships between academics and practitioners on applied built environment research projects through the collaborative inquiry model of systemic action research.

 

Town+Gown began by developing projects within service (experiential) learning programs at participating academic institutions. These in-kind exchanges, where students provide their newly learned skills and practitioners provide real problems with real data and other information to produce knowledge, are a vital component of the Town+Gown program.

Town+Gown has created projects with formal experiential learning programs (such as studios, workshops, capstones, clinics, service learning programs), informal experiential learning engagements, master’s theses, doctoral dissertations, and graduate and undergraduate classes or components of these classes.

Experiential learning engagements provide benefits to both students and practitioners. Watch our video to learn about the impact of a recent series of Fordham/Gabelli experiential learning engagements with DDC from both academic and practitioner perspectives. 

See also this article.

 

• Research Agenda

 

The Research Agenda is a tool Town+Gown uses to begin the conversation about projects. Town+Gown welcomes academics and practitioners to propose projects for inclusion in the Research Agenda. Town+Gown is currently revising the Research Agenda. Please contact Terri Matthews, Director, in the meantime, to submit ideas for new questions, get a copy of the old Research Agenda, or further details about the revision process.

See also Research Question Worksheet

Faculty-Directed Research Component

Faculty-directed research is accomplished through the Town+Gown Master Academic Consortium Contract and through third-party funded research, such as National Science Foundation grants focusing on New York City, for which Town+Gown is a named collaborator.

 

• Master Academic Consortium Contract

  Town+Gown used the PPB Rule Section 3-12 “innovative procurement” vehicle to create a master contract for academic research services (the "Consortium Contract"), with a consortium pool of the 15 academic institutions (the "Consortium") below:

   

  • Brooklyn Law School
  • City University of New York
  • Columbia University
  • Cornell University
  • Drexel University
  • Fordham University
  • Manhattan College
  • New York Institute of Technology
  • New York University
  • Pace University
  • Pratt Institute
  • State University of New York
  • The Cooper Union
  • The New School
  • Tufts University

   

  Any combination of City agencies, State agencies and certain not-for-profit corporations, using their own funds (collectively the "requesting entity"), can utilize the Consortium Contract by submitting a Town+Gown RFP to Town+Gown, as Consortium Contract administrator, for transmission to the Consortium. The Consortium institutions respond with their Proposals in Response, and the Proposal in Response selected by the requesting entity becomes the Task Order for the research project.  For a detailed description of the Town+Gown RFP/Task Order process, please see DOES YOUR AGENCY HAVE AN ACADEMIC RESEARCH NEED?!.

  • To download active Town+Gown RFP documents or to review archived Town+Gown RFP documents, please click here.
  • Form of Town+Gown RFP
  • Form of Proposal in Response
  • Form of No Response Letter
  • Form of Task Order
  • Local Law 63 Disclosure Notice Form and Request Memo 
    
  • Master Academic Consortium Contract and Appendix A



 

Requesting entities should contact the Director of Town+Gown with any questions about the process or template documents.

 

• Gown Advisory Council

 

The Consortium Contract created a Gown Advisory Council made up of representatives from the Consortium institutions. The members can access the Gown Advisory Council web page here. For additional information, researchers at Consortium institutions can contact the Director of Town+Gown or their respective representative to the Gown Advisory Council.

 

• Third-Party Funded Research

   

  Town+Gown is available to become a named collaborator on third-party grant funded research projects. If a researcher is interested in exploring having Town+Gown as a named collaborator, please contact Terri Matthews, Director.

   

  • Sustainable Healthy Cities Network

   

  Town+Gown is a named collaborator with the Sustainable Healthy Cities Network, a $12 million National Science Foundation-funded sustainability research network led by the University of Minnesota, Columbia University and Georgia Institute of Technology, for which New York City one of the “test bed” cities.  Integrated Urban Infrastructure Solutions for Environmentally Sustainable, Healthy, and Livable Cities, the network’s overall project, conducts scientific research to permit cities to reimagine their urban infrastructure—energy grids, road networks, green spaces, and food and water systems—and remain highly functional and desirable places to live and work, while promoting the health of residents and the environment.