Differentiating Research-Practice Partnerships: Affordances, Constraints, Criteria, and Strategies for Achieving Success

Research-practice partnerships (RPPs) share a common overarching purpose of using research knowledge and techniques to improve practice. But their specific goals vary along three dimensions: purpose (a commitment to generating usable knowledge versus specific solutions), locus (work inside partner districts versus work from a distance), and audience (a focus on local versus broad impact). These dimensions define a three-dimensional space in which various RPPs can be located. We argue that RPPs located at different points in this space differ in their: a) affordances, b) constraints, c) criteria for success, and d) contributors to success. We illustrate these features for one problem-solving RPP that defines problems locally but with a commitment to designing for scale. We describe how that RPP worked locally to develop one solution-the Word Generation program-that has been widely adapted and adopted, offering hypotheses regarding the contributors to success that others might contest, confirm, or extend.