KU Community Impact Summit
2027 KU Community Impact Summit
The 2027 KU Community Impact Summit, hosted by the KU Office of Community Impact in partnership with the KU Community Engagement Consortium, brings together members of the KU community and partners from across Kansas and the region to learn, connect, and advance meaningful community impact.
This year's theme, Leading Health: Every Jayhawk, Every Kansan, Every Community, invites participants to explore how community and academic partnerships can advance health and collective well-being across Kansas and beyond. Faculty, staff, students, and administrators will join community leaders, practitioners, and engaged citizens to exchange ideas, share experience and knowledge, celebrate collaborative work, co-learn, and discover new opportunities to address community priorities together.
Through the invited Engaged Leaders Speaker Series keynote address, professional development opportunities, and presentations showcasing community-engaged scholarship, creative practice, and public-impact initiatives, the Summit illuminates the many ways KU and its partners are working together to address community priorities. It will also provide opportunities to exchange ideas, build relationships across disciplines and community sectors, and identify new possibilities for collaboration. Those designated as KU Community Impact Hubs and Champions will also be recognized at the Summit.
At its core, the Summit reflects a commitment to engagement as a reciprocal practice; one in which communities are not simply recipients of university expertise, but essential partners in shaping knowledge, solutions, and change. By bringing these partners together, the Summit helps strengthen the relationships, practices, and shared vision necessary to move from individual projects to sustained community impact. The Summit marks an opportunity to celebrate where we are, learn from one another, and to consider what we can dream to advance next.
Everyone interested in community impact and engagement is welcome, including KU staff, faculty, administrators, students, and community partners. Whether you are exploring an initial partnership or building on years of collaboration, the Summit offers opportunities to contribute, learn, and explore how community-university partnerships can create meaningful community impact.
Learn and grow: Explore community-engaged scholarship, practical approaches, and lessons you can apply in your work.
Build connections: Meet people across campuses, disciplines, organizations, and communities who share your interests.
Impact with purpose: Align your work with community-identified priorities, coordinate efforts across community-university partnerships, and help ensure community-university partnerships contribute to meaningful and measurable impact with communities.
Strengthen partnerships: Exchange perspectives and develop ideas for collaboration that advances health and well-being.
Priority registration open
Register by December 1, 2026, to secure your seat and lunch preference.
Register nowBuild your summit experience
Keynote
To kick off the summit, the Engaged Leaders Speaker Series Keynote will be delivered by Ed O'Malley, President and CEO of the Kansas Health Foundation. His keynote will draw on themes from his recent book, Leading Health: How You and 30,000 Kansans Help Communities Thrive, which challenges all Kansans to view health as a shared community responsibility and highlights the leadership needed to build thriving communities. The Engaged Leaders Speaker Series is an initiative of KU Community Engagement Consortium partners, including The Commons, The KU Libraries, and the Office of Community Impact.
Participants are strongly encouraged to read the book in advance of the summit to enrich their experience and engagement with the keynote discussion. A complimentary copy may be requested through the Kansas Health Foundation's Leading Health initiative.
Optional experiences
2–3:30 p.m.
After the summit concludes at 1 p.m., continue learning through optional Deep Dive Workshops. The afternoon sessions offer additional opportunities to explore topics in depth, develop skills, and apply community engagement approaches to your own efforts. Attendees may register and participate in optional Deep Dive Workshops.
Deep Dive Workshop Sessions offered by KU Community Engagement Consortium partners on the following topics:
- Documenting and Promoting Collective Impact with the Engaged KU Tool Kit and Community Check Box System (Facilitator: Office of Community Impact)
- Service Learning Course Development Workshop (Facilitator: Center for Service Learning)
- Publishing Community Impact Scholarship: A Guide to The University Press (Facilitator: University Press)
- Understanding Tools to Advance Community Engagement through The KU Library (Facilitator: The KU Libraries)
Community and academic scientists are invited to the MARG Meet & Greet Post-Summit Reception hosted by the Community Engagement Core of the Frontiers Clinical and Translational Science Institute from 3:30-5:30 pm. Multidisciplinary Advocates and Research Group (MARG) works to foster community engagement projects. MARG Meet & Greets with institutional & community/external partners occur to establish and strengthen relationships with community partners. We will kick off our 2027 Meet and Greets as a post-summit activity.
Call for Submissions
Share your work, experiences, and ideas at the Community Impact Summit. We welcome submissions that connect with this year’s theme through community-engaged teaching, research, service, or civic engagement. Submissions may highlight emerging ideas, work in progress, established partnerships, important findings for community and university partners, creative works and performances, or lessons learned.
The submission form requests the following:
- Presentation format (e.g., Lightning Talk, Poster Session, Panel Discussion, or Performance or Interpretive Art)
- Presentation/Session Title
- Session Learning Objectives (list up to two)
- Summarizing how community impact, engagement, or partnership is supported
- Target Audience (Faculty, University Staff, University Students, University Administrators, Community Partners, All Audiences)
- Total number of presenters and roles (Faculty, University Staff, University Students, University Administrators, Community Partners); A session may have no more than four presenters.
- Presenter(s) name, department, and email
- Presenter summit registration verification (complete summit registration in advance)
- AV or Technology Needs
- Accommodation Request
Share a community-engaged project, partnership, research, or service-learning effort through a visual display and informal conversation with Summit attendees. Posters offer opportunities to highlight emerging ideas, work in progress, findings, or lessons learned while connecting with others who share similar interests. Creative works presented in a visual format, such as art exhibits or displays, may be submitted as a poster presentation or as a creative work.
Lightning Talk (5-7 minutes): Present a focused overview of a community-engaged initiative, project, or practice related to research, service-learning, and/or outreach. Presentations should highlight the purpose, approach, and key findings or lessons learned, and implications for community impact. A lightning presentation is a brief, 5-7 minute talk organized around a shared theme or topic, and may also be used to provide updates on key findings. There will be three consecutive presentations followed by a period after all presentations are completed. Abstracts are submitted individually and the program committee organizes selected talks into sessions covering complementary themes and topics.
The 30-minute discussions bring together people with different perspectives to explore a shared topic, challenge, or opportunity. Panels should include a moderator and invite audience participation. Including both community and academic voices is encouraged. There should be no more than four participants, including the moderator on the panel.
Artists, performers, and creative practitioners are invited to submit abstracts for a performance or interpretive art pieces that represent or explore community engagement. Submissions may include live performances, interactive installations, spoken word, movement-based works, or other creative expressions that spark dialogue, foster connection, and inspire collective action. The performance or creative work should be no more than 5-7 minutes in duration in presented. Creative works presented in a visual format, such as art exhibits or displays, may be submitted as a poster presentation or as a creative work.