"So, This Is Actually Going to Somebody, Right?": Critical Reflections on Participatory Planning, Implementation, and Evaluation of a Peer Support Group for Parents From Historically Marginalized Communities.

This article critically examines the design, implementation, and evaluation of a peer support group for young parents from historically marginalized racialized communities in a northeastern U.S. city, developed through community-based participatory research (CBPR) and culturally responsive evaluation (CRE) approaches. The peer-led support group aimed to share experiential knowledge for navigating social service systems and provide psychosocial support, with active involvement of peer leaders in all project phases. Key tensions emerged between academic researchers' structured facilitation methods and peer leaders' preference for informal, non-hierarchical interactions, as well as between community expectations for immediate, sustained impact and academic/funder timelines that limited ongoing engagement. The study highlights both the strengths and limitations of CBPR and CRE in addressing structural constraints within neoliberal academic institutions and recommends greater transparency, flexibility, and shared decision-making to better align community and academic priorities in participatory public health initiatives.