Priority Action Areas

Action Area One: Situate research to be accountable to communities

Research practices, funding, and sharing of findings are ethically accountable to communities, are led or co-led by community members, and build on community-centered knowledge, wisdom, beliefs, and lived experience, rather than validating or verifying them. The leadership and knowledge of community-based research are uplifted and embraced as part of the larger action research ecosystem, situated equitably alongside and in collaboration with academic and industry research.
Action Area Two: Prioritize the social impact of research findings

The priority of health equity research is to center action and advance social change. Research metrics and incentives are tied to how the work advances racial and Indigenous health justice and helps shape policy and practice, shifting the focus from individual achievement or institutional net profit to collective social impact. Needs and solutions identified by communities serve as the foundation for community-research collaboration that draws from multiple knowledge sources to increase both breadth and depth of action research impacts.
Action Area Three: Embed principles of justice and liberation in health equity research culture

Researchers, funders, journal editors, academics, and community partners are equipped through training, mentorship, and institutional support to apply situationally appropriate anti-racist and anti-colonial principles in the design, implementation, and sharing of research.
Action Area Four: Work in coordination to achieve collective action

Funders, journal editors, academic institutions, and community partners (i.e., HSKS decision-makers and players) work in tandem, rather than within competing systems, through coordinated networks and coalitions, and foster a culture of collaboration among people and organizations working towards a shared goal. This effort begins with like-minded organizations committed to working together to change how the HSKS operates and how its actors engage with one another.
Action Area Five: Bolster the infrastructure needed to support an equitable and durable health equity research ecosystem

Researchers, funders, journal editors, academic institutions, and community partners collaborate in coalition to bolster sustainable and long-term infrastructure within the HSKS, investing resources to support the system and its actors, creating learning infrastructure, and establishing effective communication systems. This strengthening establishes and actualizes the value of health equity research, provides protections and support for those doing that work, and enables the research ecosystem to operate more cohesively and equitably across emergent challenges.