Defining Public Impact Research
Public impact research addresses a societal problem and creates public value.1 Framing a problem, filling an evidence gap, or providing legitimacy for solutions are all ways that research can create public value. The Public Impact Research Accelerator (PIR Accelerator) is specifically focused on the local component of public impact– accelerating research that benefits the people and communities surrounding our universities at the state and local levels. The PIR accelerator is based on the premise that university research is more likely to create public value when it is intentionally designed with an in-depth understanding of people and place. This work is grounded by a fundamental commitment to helping everyday people – program operators, nonprofit and public managers, community leaders, state policymakers – make progress on a problem at hand. Beyond immediate problem-solving, it is anchored in enhancing public values and strengthening society’s collective capacity to understand complex challenges, deliberate about shared futures, and act together.
There is no singular approach to conducting public impact research; rather, there are core principles that guide public impact research:
- Addresses important societal problems
- Reflects in-depth understanding of context
- Employs appropriate methods of Inquiry
- Demonstrates integrity and respect
- Generates actionable knowledge and resources
- Creates public value
Schools of public affairs at public research universities are uniquely equipped to lead this type of public impact given: (1) our expertise in public programs, policies, and public and nonprofit governance; (2) our understanding of state and local capacity and infrastructure, ranging from human resource systems to administrative data systems; (3) the essential roles we already play in our states’ ecosystems—our students and alumni are the very practitioners and policymakers that stand to benefit from university research at the state and local levels; and (4) our field’s longstanding emphasis on defining, safeguarding, and creating public value.
The PIR Accelerator is a time-limited initiative to build capacity and shift the institutional landscape for public impact research within and across public research universities, amplifying the role for schools and scholars of public affairs in this moment. The PIR Accelerator is structured as a knowledge commons — pooling, collating, and disseminating tools and resources to learn, share, build, fund, and recognize public impact research within and across universities.