When institutions like universities reach out in collaboration with neighboring communities, they are reaching across boundaries that are both literal and metaphorical. At Drexel we have found that the work of becoming an engaged anchor institution pushes us to reflect on our institutional boundaries: how we physically demarcate the campus, and how we sustain procedural walls around our business operations that may be challenging for potential new vendors, partners, and employees to overcome.

Although Drexel’s University City campus doesn’t have anything like a perimeter wall or fence around most of it, when we considered the physical layout of our campus we identified ways we could make it feel more welcoming: one of the results is a series of green spaces that not only beckon neighbors to sit and rest as they are walking through campus, but which also create spaces for students to gather for talking, studying, or playing. 

Understanding some of the challenges in terms of credentialing, paperwork, and procedure that our neighbors must overcome has been equally important. When we looked for opportunities to boost local hiring, we had to take into account the reality that all of our entry-level jobs required a high school diploma: this is a wall to climb for residents of a neighborhood where the average adult literacy is at a fourth-grade level. Being able to see our own walls in this case helped us design a set of ladders that would assist local jobseekers over the top: adult education, GED and diploma completion, and computer labs supporting digital access and digital literacy training. Being able to drop our defenses and trust in the strength of the working relationship with an important workforce-access partner likewise enabled us to share our hiring and retention data with that partner, getting an analysis in return that was an essential part of building an effective set of customized job training programs.

In our procurement and purchasing work, we identified hurdles that an emerging small business would have to deal with, starting with how hard a local business owner would have to work to get in the door, from the availability of advice and information to the challenges of building out to meet volume expectations. Becoming a vendor for a major institution requires a substantial investment by the business when it comes to making sure all insurance coverages are in place, that there is adequate capacity to handle large orders efficiently, that there is a web presence, and the ability to do business digitally. That investment becomes a real risk when volumes can’t be guaranteed. 

And so part of Drexel’s process of growing into its engaged-anchor role has been growing into a greater self-awareness of where we have placed our boundaries, followed by internal problem-solving that addresses how we can either undo those barriers, or create legible pathways around and over them for neighborhood partners. 

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