Q: What made you interested in the role of Chief Strategist for Community Engagement and Partnerships?

When President Alivisatos asked me to take on this role, I think what appealed to me most was the opportunity to help strengthen work that I already believed deeply in.

Throughout my career, I've seen the tremendous value of thoughtful, long-term partnerships between universities and communities. The University's commitment to community engagement isn't new, nor is this new role about creating a new strategy. I saw it as an opportunity to build on decades of work by helping connect people and ideas across the institution, strengthening relationships with our community partners, and being more intentional about where the University can make its greatest contribution.

That felt like a natural extension of both my scholarship and my work as dean. Much of my career has been spent thinking about how research, education, and community partnership reinforce one another. This role creates an opportunity to bring those experiences together in service of the University and our neighboring communities.

Q: How is community engagement connected to the University's mission?

Community engagement isn't separate from the University's mission. It's one way we fulfill it.

I think one of the University's greatest contributions comes through scholarship, education, research, clinical care, and our ability to bring people together across disciplines and sectors to address complex problems. Our role isn't to solve every challenge facing our communities. Rather, it's to contribute where our distinctive strengths can make the greatest difference.

Universities also have the privilege of taking a long view. We can stay engaged over many years, building knowledge, educating future leaders, and helping address challenges that no single organization can solve alone.

I've come to believe that our scholarship is stronger when it's informed by the experiences and questions emerging from communities. Our students gain a deeper understanding of the world they're preparing to lead in. Faculty develop new ideas, new collaborations, and new discoveries through those relationships. At its best, community partnership advances both the University's mission and the vitality of our neighboring communities.

Q: What have you learned from your decades of working alongside communities across Chicago?

One of the most important lessons I've learned is that meaningful partnerships begin with listening.

I've spent much of my career working alongside schools, neighborhood organizations, public agencies, and residents across Chicago's South and West Sides. Those experiences have reinforced that communities bring tremendous knowledge, expertise, and assets of their own. Universities bring different strengths. The most meaningful work happens when those strengths come together around shared goals.

Another thing I've learned is that lasting relationships take time. Trust isn't built through a single grant, program, or initiative. It's built by showing up consistently, listening carefully, being honest about what you can contribute, and learning together over many years.

This work is also personal for me. As a first-generation college student, I understand how transformative education can be—not only for individuals, but for families and communities. That experience has reinforced my belief that universities have a responsibility to expand opportunity in the broadest sense—through educating students, advancing knowledge, and working alongside communities on the issues that matter most.

Q: How would you describe the University's approach to community engagement today?

The University's commitment to community partnership is longstanding. Across the South Side and throughout Chicago, faculty, staff, students, physicians, clinicians, and researchers have built important relationships over many years. Those relationships remain the foundation of this work.

What has changed over the past decade is the scale and breadth of community engagement across the institution. Today, remarkable work is happening across schools, divisions, research centers, UChicago Medicine, administrative units, and student programs.

I think one of the opportunities before us is to be more intentional—not simply about what we're doing, but about why we're doing it, where the University can make its greatest contribution, how we learn from one another, and how we understand our collective impact. It's about strengthening an already strong foundation.

Q: How do you decide where the University should focus its community engagement efforts?

One of the things I've come to believe over many years is that universities are most effective when they don't try to do everything.

There are many important issues facing our city, and many organizations doing extraordinary work. The University's contribution is different. I think we have the greatest opportunity to make a meaningful contribution when the University's distinctive strengths align with priorities that communities themselves have identified.

That's the thinking behind our focus on areas such as K–12 education, health, public safety, economic opportunity, and the arts. These are areas where the University and Medical Center have exceptional expertise and where we've heard consistently from community partners that there are opportunities to work together. We want to be thoughtful and intentional so that our efforts are meaningful, sustainable, and ultimately have the greatest impact.

Q: What role will the Office of Civic Engagement play?

One thing I've heard consistently—from both colleagues and community partners—is that the University can be difficult to navigate. That's understandable. Universities are decentralized by design, and that's part of what makes them intellectually vibrant. But community partners shouldn't have to understand our organizational structure to identify the right people or the right resources.

The Office of Civic Engagement has an important role to play in helping make those connections. It can serve as a trusted point of contact, build and sustain relationships across neighborhoods, convene conversations across the institution, and help ensure that what we hear from our community partners helps to inform work happening throughout the University.

As community engagement has expanded across the institution, I think OCE's role has evolved as well. I don't think community engagement is the responsibility of one office. It's the responsibility of the University. One of OCE's most important roles is helping connect those efforts so that, together, we can be more thoughtful, more intentional, and ultimately more effective.

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