University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus

CO-CEAL: Colorado Community Engagement Alliance

Partnering with Communities to Improve Health

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) Community Engagement Alliance — also known as CEAL — works to promote health, improve health outcomes, and strengthen partnerships through community-engaged research.

CEAL achieves this by partnering with communities to:

Build trust in science and research.
Ensure inclusion across the research continuum.
Advance community-driven solutions addressing health disparities.
Strengthen community-engaged research.

Our strength is in our communities. The Community Engagement Alliance (CEAL) is a national network of community-engaged researchers, community-based organizations, government officials and public health experts funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH).

NIH

CO-CEAL: Colorado Community Engagement Alliance

The Colorado Community Engagement Alliance (CO-CEAL) is a partnership between the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus, several community-based organizations, and dozens of trusted local community members. We currently work with 5 urban and rural communities across Colorado to address local health concerns.

Boot Camp Translation (BCT), or sometimes called “Community Translation,” leverages the expertise of community members to translate dense scientific evidence and guidelines into messages, campaigns and materials that are locally relevant. Groups create materials that call local community members to action to promote a specific topic.

Generally, BCT has evolved from its beginning as an effort to include the High Plains Research Network’s Community Advisory Council in a project to increase screening rates for colon cancer, into what is now a standardized, proven process that has been replicated within many communities and throughout many projects in Colorado and across the country.

The rapid BCT process typically lasts between six and nine months, and includes a series of in-person and phone meetings. The rapid BCT model will take place in five communities and will guide participants through the entire BCT process in an eight-week period, completely virtually. Groups will work with trained BCT facilitators, community connectors, medical experts and graphic designers to produce high quality materials that present the messages and information to the particular communities and are distributed in local venues.

Boot Camp Translation: A Method for Building a Community of Solution

Testing to Prevent Colon Cancer: How Rural Community Members Took on a Community-Based Intervention

Reinventing The Wheel Of Medical Evidence: How The Boot Camp Translation Process Is Making Gains

A Community Engagement Method to Design Patient Engagement Materials for Cardiovascular Health