Start a Project
The Social Publishers Foundation supports crowdfunding of practitioner-research throughout the year. Start by reviewing the eligibility requirements and application guidelines and then complete the application linked below.
Eligibility
The foundation supports practitioner-researchers and action-researchers working to strengthen practice and assess results of practice in a number of areas. Eligible participants include practitioners employed in:
- Education (preK-12 and community colleges)
- Community-based non-profit child, family & youth service organizations
- Community-based non-profit health care clinics
- Community-based or school-based youth participatory action research (YPAR) initiatives
Also eligible are:
- Community-based and neighborhood initiatives involving collaborative action research and/or participatory research in which community members are co-equals with professional practitioners in a collaborative effort to address a community or neighborhood issue.
Priority: The Foundation wishes to focus its efforts on proposals by practitioners, preservice practitioners, and participatory action researchers (YPAR and CPAR) working in non-university settings.
Guidelines
- To apply for inclusion in the Foundation’s crowdfunding, follow these steps: (a) develop your idea for a practitioner-led project (click here for helpful idea development for practitioner-research); and (b) complete and submit the application for crowdfunding.
- All applications will be reviewed by the Foundation in a timely manner. Applicants of approved projects will be notified of next steps. In some cases, the application may have strong potential but some revision is necessary. For these applications, we will ask applicants to modify and resubmit.
- The Foundation uses a peer-review process for all crowdfunding applications. Foundation reviewers include experienced researchers and practitioner-researchers in a wide variety of fields associated with education and human services. The Foundation believes that collaborations between experienced researchers and practitioners in local communities and contexts will lead to rigorous examinations of what works and a more balanced perspective regarding evidence-based practice and practice-based evidence. Project results will be shared through the Foundation’s online knowledge base to improve education and services for children, youth, adults and families in a wide variety of social domains and socio-cultural contexts.
- All practitioner-researchers and action-researchers funded through the Foundation’s website agree to become social publishers by publishing the results of their work on this website. In the view of the Foundation, the sharing of the knowledge produced by practitioners is social publishing with a social conscience.
- All practitioner-researchers and action-researchers crowd-funded through the Foundation’s website agree to practice Protection of Human Participants and to follow institutional review processes relevant to their work and/or community settings.
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What is a Social Publisher?
Social publishing involves new forms of online content creation. The social publishing supported by the Foundation democratizes knowledge production and dissemination to foster progress in a variety of social domains.
The social publishers included in the Foundation’s knowledge base are the owners of their knowledge and products, but are willing to share them for free with practitioners around the world. More information about copyrights of the intellectual properties on the Foundation’s website is provided in Creative Commons. To find more information about becoming a Social Publisher, go to PUBLISH YOUR WORK. The website’s knowledge base will be an open-access source of practitioner-research, participatory research, and action research that will be promoted globally.