The criteria CUP will utilize for defining effective partnerships are:

1. They must be a significant relationship between University resources and community needs.
2. They must involve an off-campus partner.
3. They should demonstrate the "self-supporting" nature of the project or that they can be self-supporting in the future.
4. They must have a clear purpose(s) and intended outcome(s).
5. They must have a workable plan, resources, budget, and realistic time frames.
6. They must generate measurable outcomes and have proper evaluation processes.
7. They must present the University in a positive light and lend themselves to being publicized.
8. They must engage students in appropriate role(s) to meet their service learning needs.
9. They should engage faculty in appropriate roles.
10. They should be committed to sharing and reporting the outcomes, knowledge and findings within and beyond the partnership.
11. They should insure that all reporting processes provide proper credit to those partners who actively produced the outcomes.

These criteria were adapted from those originally developed by Community Campus Partnerships for Health.