Jayceelyn Aranton (left) leads UD graduate students Nancy Nguyen, Shay Pinhey, Mels Ayala and Emily Frazer-Abel on a tour of the Western YMCA. The students, who are all members of the graduate student group Community Connectors, hope to build relationships with YMCA members.

Fostering community engagement at the YMCA

Article by Tabitha Groh Photos by Ashley Barnas Larrimore July 10, 2024

UD’s Partnership for Healthy Communities and the Western YMCA kick off new collaboration

A new cooperative agreement between the University of Delaware’s Partnership for Healthy Communities (PHC) and the Western YMCA aims to expand opportunities for University researchers and students to connect with the local community.

Through the collaboration, University faculty, staff and students can volunteer their time to support YMCA programs and in return can promote their own studies or health-related opportunities.

Spearheading the partnership are Alyssa Lanzi, assistant professor of communication sciences and disorders in the College of Health Sciences, and Francisco Zambrano, Western YMCA’s community executive director.

“The Western YMCA is a great partnership site because of its proximity to UD and its focus on healthy living across the spectrum from youth to older adults,” said Lanzi, who also serves as the community engagement core director for the Delaware Center for Cognitive Aging Research.

Zambrano sees the partnership as a good fit for the YMCA’s ongoing mission.

“Both the YMCA of Delaware and the Partnership for Healthy Communities share a common purpose — to advance health equity, enhance community well-being, create inclusive environments for all, and inspire service to others,” he said.

Alyssa Lanzi (right) addresses UD students at an open house at the Western YMCA in May while Yendelela Cuffee, assistant professor of epidemiology and associate director of the Partnership for Healthy Communities, listens.

Roxanne Williams, a local community member and past research study participant, recently joined the Resilient Cognitive Aging Lab (RECALL) as the community outreach coordinator, responsible for engaging with community members and recruiting research participants with a particular emphasis on engaging with African Americans.

“My initial participation began because of family members that I lost to Alzheimer’s and dementia,” Williams said. “I wanted to be the person to get more of us African Americans to participate, because that's the only way they're gonna find a cure. You can participate in the study and be helpful to generations after you.”

Building trust with the community is key, Williams said.

“If a person isn't comfortable, if they feel threatened or if they feel like the information is over their heads, they're going to stay away,” she said.

Williams was on hand at a YMCA open house held in May and plans to have a presence there two to three times a month.

Several members of Community Connectors: Graduate Student Outreach also attended the open house. The graduate student organization is dedicated to supporting early-stage researchers in community engaged research.

Soumya Bhat, a doctoral student in biomechanics and movement sciences and founding member of the student group, attended the open house to learn more about opportunities to engage with the community.

Roxanne Williams (left), community outreach coordinator for the Resilient Cognitive Aging Lab, is a familiar face to Western YMCA staff members like Jayceelyn Aranton.

“My research focuses on how people across different age groups learn walking patterns,” Bhat said. “We realized that there's a lack of diversity in the people that participate in research. Besides increasing diversity, having a good relationship with science can really benefit the community in general and can help them become healthier.”

Mels Ayala and Emily Frazer-Abel, doctoral students in communication sciences and disorders, study early bilingualism and second language acquisition in children.

“We'd love to be able to educate and inform families and build partnerships by consistently coming to the Y,” Ayala said.

To support their own research, Ayala said they look “to recruit any families that might want to help us answer some unanswered questions when it comes to early language development.”

“As researchers, it's so easy to get sucked into our own bubble of academics and research and wanting to help communities in our own way,” Frazer-Abel said. “But ultimately, it's about the people in these communities … and [it] takes us being in the community to be able to do that research effectively.”

More information about participating in volunteer or research opportunities at the Western YMCA will be available on the Resilient Cognitive Aging Lab website.