Academic–community collaboration: An ecology for early childhood violence prevention

The growing supportive evidence for multi-faceted approaches to violence prevention certainly demand that multi-agency collaborations will continue to proliferate as communities engage in early childhood prevention strategies. These collaborations often include partnerships between members of academia and community agencies that often produce unique challenges and benefits related to diverse experiences, skills, agendas, and practical constraints. This article describes the Jacksonville First and Best Teacher Initiative, an example of one such collaborative model for violence prevention, to illustrate many of the principles of effective academic–community collaborations and lessons learned in addressing the specific challenges of such programs.