USU Transforming Communities Institute

10/04/2026

What does reciprocal partnership between a university and a community look like? 🤝

At Friday's Community-Engaged Teaching & Research Symposium, hosted by TCI, community partners, faculty, and students talked candidly about building trust, making sure communities get as much out of the work as universities do, and what happens when a project gets hard.

Thank you to our panelists 💙
• Kaitlyn Line, MSW student and TCI intern
• Mikaela Cannon, Instructional Technology & Learning Sciences PhD student
• Lucas Martin, Executive Director, Bear River Association of Governments (BRAG)
• Heather Crockett, Executive Director, WAB Warming Center
• Dr. Maureen Boyle, Social Work faculty
• Dr. Elsa Perez, World Languages & Cultures faculty
• Moderator: Dr. Jayme Walters, TCI Executive Director

Thank you to Provost Chris Corcoran and Associate Vice Provost of Community Engagement Dave Anderson for opening the day, to Karina Brown of Cache Refugee and Immigrant Connection for an inspiring partnership presentation, to our breakout session leaders, and to everyone who joined us in person and on Zoom. A special thank-you to TCI's Erin Jensen for organizing the symposium!

Want to be part of this community? Join the TCI Collaboratory 👉 https://artsci.usu.edu/social-work/transforming-communities-institute/tci-collaboratory

09/07/2026

Please join us in welcoming Dr. Lu Lawrence as the Transforming Communities Institute’s first Associate Director of Research Development (ADRD)!

Dr. Lawrence is an Assistant Professor in USU’s Department of Instructional Technology & Learning Sciences and has been involved with TCI for the last three years. She led a community-engaged strategic planning project with the USU Swaner Preserve & EcoCenter, guiding their stakeholders toward priorities and a work plan grounded in community voice. In the Community Justice Advocate (CJA) program, she has helped shape our training to be digestible for helping professionals outside the legal field and has pushed thinking about the systems that support CJAs once they are in the field.

As ADRD, Dr. Lawrence becomes TCI’s connector and advisor for community-engaged research and solution-building: guiding partners and USU researchers through the earliest stages of a project, growing the TCI Collaboratory into a pipeline of collaborators, working with the team to construct the USU Community Network, and creating the shared resources that will make our approach usable across campus and beyond.

Welcome, Dr. Lawrence. We are excited to have your leadership in TCI!

09/03/2026

TCI MSW intern, Kaitlyn, is also a community justice advocate (CJA) in training. Today, she, alongside her attorney mentor, helped a client negotiate a settlement that saved them $10,000. Read her case reflection below. ⬇️
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When I completed the Community Justice Advocate course through Utah State University's Transforming Communities Institute, I was excited to help people in new ways and bridge the gap in access to legal services. But taking on my first case, I was nervous too. As a trained social worker, I never imagined I'd be navigating the nuances of legal processes, especially something as complex as debt collection.

My first client was facing significant debt after a series of unfortunate life events, with limited ability to pay it off. After trying to resolve things directly with one creditor, they were served with a court summons demanding over $27,000. They had no knowledge of court procedures and no idea how to respond to the papers in front of them. By the time I stepped in, the plaintiff had already filed a motion for summary judgment — a critical and time-sensitive turning point in the case.

In a traditional social work role, I wouldn't have had the knowledge or standing to step into that situation. But the CJA training gave me the tools to explain what the motion meant, walk my client through their options, and advocate on their behalf. These abilities made room for a better outcome: we negotiated a settlement outside of court that saved my client close to $10,000 off the amount they owed.

This case is a clear example of what the CJA program makes possible: trained advocates stepping into the space between social work and legal representation, so people don't fall through the cracks of a system they don't understand. Seeing my client move from confusion and fear to a resolution they could actually manage was a powerful reminder of why this work matters. It's exactly the kind of access to justice that so many people need and rarely get.

08/12/2026

Utah has a promising solution to its access-to-justice crisis — and it needs your help.

In today's Salt Lake Tribune, USU TCI Executive Director and Social Work professor, Dr. Jayme Walters, makes the case for Community Justice Advocates (CJAs): trained professionals who help Utahns navigate civil legal problems like evictions, debt collection, and domestic violence at a cost people can actually afford (free). As she writes, the CJA model is "changing the way legal services are delivered."

Worth a read and worth sharing with someone who should know this option exists. 🔗

“The CJA model is changing the way legal services are delivered,” Jayme Walters writes in an op-ed.

07/31/2026

Utah State University Department of Social Work and TCI are seeking a Field & Outreach Coordinator for our Community Justice Advocate (CJA) program.

The coordinator will help expand access to justice across Utah by building and managing the CJA Corps, our statewide infrastructure connecting trained CJAs with community organizations and field opportunities where they can provide limited-scope legal services.

This person will develop field placements, recruit and support host agencies, strengthen partnerships with service providers and community leaders, coordinate program operations, and help shape the future of legal service delivery in Utah.

📍 Based in the Salt Lake City area
🏠 Hybrid work eligible
🚗 Statewide travel required
💼 Full-time, benefited position
💰 $70,000 salary with excellent benefits

Are you passionate about access to justice or serving low-income members of our community? Have a track record of successfully growing a program with verifiable success? Are you ready for the next step in your career where you help shape the future of an emerging profession? Come join our innovative...

06/12/2026

First place!! $10,000. Out of 115 submissions.
Congratulations to our own Melaine Webster — USU MSW student, Community Justice Advocate, and TCI intern — who just WON The Policy Project’s Policy Pitch Competition! Melaine pitched a smarter, fairer, and fiscally responsible approach to Utah’s criminal debt system: one that supports successful reentry and keeps accountability realistic for people working to rebuild their lives after justice system involvement. We are so proud of you, Melaine. This is the heart of social work and community justice.

06/11/2026

At the Transforming Communities Institute, we're always looking for what community engagement looks like when it's built on mutual benefit. This is a stellar example at USU to highlight -- thanks The Herald Journal!

A year ago, Utah Food Bank brought an idea to USU's Student Nutrition Access Center- SNAC and Cache Community Food Pantry: a monthly mobile food pantry to reach more Cache Valley residents. One year in, the impact is clear:

🥫 2,000+ households served
📦 ~123,000 pounds of food distributed
🙌 282 volunteers

What makes this a model worth studying is the mutual benefit. This initiative was led by one of SNAC's student directors, Kaiah, as part of her senior capstone project. This effort runs on USU's physical assets — Parking & Transportation donates the Maverick Stadium lot and sets out the cones every month before sunrise. It runs on people power from USU and many community volunteers. And it's open to everyone in Cache Valley, not just campus.

It also lives out USU's land grant mission and puts the new strategic plan in action. The pantry advances the university's commitment to statewide impact — strengthening access and economic mobility for the communities we serve — while embodying the mission of learning, discovery, and engagement. A student-led project that delivers a real public good is exactly what "student success and value" looks like beyond the classroom. That's the heart of what we work toward: meeting a critical community need by leaning into the assets and talent an institution already has, in partnership with the community it serves.

Congratulations to the SNAC team on a remarkable first year. 👏

Next pantry: July 14, 9–10 a.m. at Maverick Stadium. Volunteers and word-of-mouth welcome.

Once a month Utah State University’s Student Nutrition Access Center hosts a mobile food pantry in collaboration with Utah Food Bank and Cache Community Food Pantry.

06/10/2026

✨Our intern Melaine is doing big things as a social worker in training and CJA volunteer with Nonprofit Legal Services of Utah✨ We are proud of her!

🎉 Huge news: our MSW student Melaine Webster is one of three finalists — out of 115 — in The Policy Project’s statewide Policy Pitch Competition!

Her pitch will discuss reforms to Utah’s criminal debt collection system, work she’s lived as a Community Justice Advocate, volunteering for Nonprofit Legal Services of Utah. Melaine is also a graduate intern with USU Transforming Communities Institute.

She presents in Salt Lake City this Friday, June 12. Go cheer her on, Aggies. 💙

https://www.usu.edu/today/story/usu-social-work-student-is-finalist-in-policy-pitch-competition

04/04/2026

Congratulations to TCI Faculty Fellows, Drs. Wallis and Lawrence, on winning their respective college awards for Undergraduate Research Mentors of the Year and their mentees, Kaitlyn and Eva, for winning the Undergraduate Researchers of the Year awards! We are proud of you 👏🏻

04/02/2026

We are in the midst of training our second cohort of Community Justice Advocates (CJAs). This week, we are grateful to Judge Angela Fonnesbeck (Utah First District Court) for serving as our guest legal expert. She shared invaluable insights on courtroom etiquette, procedures, and available resources—helping our CJAs feel more prepared to support self-represented Utahns with confidence. We appreciate her willingness to answer thoughtful questions and connect real-world practice to our work. Visit cja.usu.edu to learn more about the CJA Program.