Creating Structures for Meaningful Indigenous Community and UBC Health Partnerships, or simply Creating Structures, is a Faculty of Medicine Strategic Investment Fund (SIF) internal research project completed in 2025 by the Human Early Learning Partnership (HELP) and the Centre for Excellence in Indigenous Health (CEIH).
Though the project began in 2022, there were larger conversations happening around Indigenous-led research within the context of UBC and other Western academic institutions well before receiving a SIF. Reflecting on these conversations and the challenging nature of conducting community-based research at UBC, it became clear that in order to promote further dialogue and inspire change, there must first be dedicated spaces for researchers and Indigenous community members to safely reflect, communicate, and collaborate to envision new possibilities. Noticing these spaces were largely absent within the University’s existing framework, the team shifted focus to provide support for meaningful partnerships from the ground up by asking, “What structures can we create, grow, and sustain to truly support these relationships?”
The findings from the Creating Structures project are a rich collection of themes organized into four categories: Strengths of Meaningful Partnerships, Continued Challenges in Partnerships, Student Voices: Ideas for Change, and Continued Challenges for Students. These findings are summarized in Creating Structures’ “Blueprint for Moving Forward with Reconciliation and Research,” which dives deeper into the story of the project, as well as in two infographics.