The video shows that community-based researchers share a willingness to let their community shape what they do in the research. The video features Zeina Amro, Doctoral Researcher, Kings College London and Hassan Al Haloush, English language teacher, MAPS Al Amal School.

We refer to this as ‘co-design’. It means that the research project is not fully planned in advance, but adapts to the researcher’s early explorations in the community. The researchers may plan their project quite differently when they discover the people who really make a difference to what happens in the community, or find a new perspective on the issue they had not thought of.

For example, Zeina is doing an academic project but sets out first to listen to the community members before defining the research question.

Another example is provided by Hassan who listened to the parents of the children he was teaching, so that he could engage them in helping with the type of learning he was trying to foster. But he could not have done this without listening to their perspectives.

Over to you

Use the forum to reflect on what makes community based research different from other kinds of research. You will use your understanding to answer the Quiz in the next Step.