INSTITUTE FOR URBAN RESEARCH

The fundamental objective of Southern Illinois University Edwardsville’s Institute for Urban Research is to create and test paradigms and programs that will help federal, state, and local agencies combat chronic urban problems in Southwest Illinois, especially the Metro East portion of the region. The Institute for Urban Research will develop, test, implement, and disseminate an innovative urban partnership model to offer a more unified, proactive, and efficient system for addressing urban problems. The Institute will not provide direct services, as does the Southern Illinois University Edwardsville (SIUE) East St. Louis Center. Rather, it will conduct research on urban issues important to the region. The Institute has three basic goals:

Stimulate a public discussion of a policy agenda for Metro East.
Conduct policy-oriented research significant to Metro East.
Convene policy-makers and leaders from multiple sectors to conduct informed, action-oriented deliberations addressing complex issues affecting Metro East.

To accomplish these goals the Institute convenes an Advisory Board of regional stakeholders as needed. The Advisory Board identifies salient issues that are shaped into a research agenda by the Institute’s Coordinating Council. The members of this interdisciplinary Council include faculty researchers from the SIUE campus. The Institute has the ability to contract with SIUE faculty or researchers from other universities with recognized expertise, to develop research designs and conduct the research. The findings will be presented to the Advisory Board for possible action and to the public through structured forums.

The complex, critical health and welfare issues of Metro East, that are typical of similarly troubled urban areas around the nation, are exceptionally difficult to address. Isolated responses by supporters, governmental agencies, and other units, regardless of their resources and good intentions, often cannot adequately surmount these difficulties. Government programs can quickly become institutionalized and bureaucratized because health and welfare issues are dynamic and regional, government efforts are often fragmented and do not always target the underlying causes of problems. The ongoing work of the Institute for Urban Research will play an essential role in correcting these deficiencies. It will allow SIUE to collaborate with its urban partners to produce reliable information and state-of-the-art intervention models that are necessary to help community leaders improve the quality of life in Metro East and other urban areas.