Community-Engaged Scholarship: An Interpartner Approach for Collaborative Practice
Add a community project to every supervisee’s plan and grade their teamwork with IPECP rubrics.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Spencer et al. (2026) wrote a how-to paper. They mixed two ideas: community-engaged scholarship and IPECP teamwork skills. The goal was to show BCBAs how to train supervisees who can work with anyone—therapists, families, neighbors, local groups.
The paper is not a lab study. It is a map. It tells you to add real-world projects—like planning a park play day with parents and teachers—into supervision hours.
What they found
The authors say the blend works. When trainees help run a community project, they practice four IPECP skills: values/ethics, roles, communication, and teamwork. The projects also build cultural humility because clients lead the way.
No numbers are given. The finding is the model itself: a step-by-step way to turn “collaboration” into observable actions a supervisee can rehearse and a supervisor can score.
How this fits with other research
Slim et al. (2021) first translated IPECP words into ABA terms. Spencer keeps those definitions and adds the community piece. It is a direct next chapter, not a fight.
Donnelly et al. (2025) designed a half-day workshop where ABA students role-play with OT and SLP peers. Spencer widens the circle: instead of only peer professionals, trainees work with clients, families, and local leaders. The papers agree; Spencer just gives more seats at the table.
Boivin et al. (2021) rotated BCBA trainees through SLP, OT, PT, and doctor offices. Spencer keeps the rotation spirit but moves it outside clinic walls. Community projects replace hospital shifts. Both aim for the same teamwork skills, just in different zip codes.
Why it matters
You can start Monday. Pick one client goal that needs community help—say, ordering food at a café. Ask the trainee to plan one practice session with the client, the café manager, and a peer. You watch, score teamwork skills from the paper’s rubric, and give feedback. One hour, one real-life collaboration, zero extra cost.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
Abstract The need to prepare future behavior analysts to become effective, collaborative professionals is increasingly evident. The social importance of goals, procedures, and effects has always been a critical part of our applied science; yet too often it is superseded in priority by considerations of procedural integrity. Disciplinary centrism, often cultivated through traditional training models, can be counterbalanced through intentional promotion of cultural and professional humility. We argue that community-engaged scholarship (CES) offers a behaviorally compatible framework for collaboration training and emphasizes the same collaboration skills should extend beyond interprofessional collaborations to include nonprofessionals (e.g., clients, families, communities). Because CES emphasizes reciprocal learning “about, from, and with” all potential partners—including those receiving services—and naturally positions students alongside nonbehavioral collaborators with varied lived experiences and professional perspectives, we use the term interpartner as an alternative to interprofessional. When CES is paired with the Interprofessional Education and Collaborative Practice (IPECP) competencies—values and ethics, roles and responsibilities, interprofessional communication, and teams and teamwork—it creates a powerful, inclusive model for cultivating collaboration skills in behavior analytic trainees. This blended approach aligns with the core aims of applied behavior analysis while advancing its relevance and responsiveness in diverse service contexts. In this paper, we first provide an overview of key concepts from IPECP and CES. We then illustrate the application of the Participatory Action Cycle for Community Engagement through two case examples that highlight how CES can serve as a foundational context for interpartner education within behavior analytic training.
Behavior and Social Issues, 2026 · doi:10.1007/s42822-025-00239-z