Partnerships between university researchers and land managers are important to create and support critical pathways for identifying and addressing today’s conservation challenges. This webinar will focus on efforts at Stanford University to better understand effective partnerships between universities and land trusts. We will discuss three aspects of the work: 1) an Open Space Management Practicum designed to engage students and land managers in research to produce conservation solutions 2) the development of tools to support researchers and land managers in partnerships, and (3) an examination of the successes and challenges of land-trust research/practice partnerships. Through such collaborations, land managers and researchers have the opportunity to contribute to decision-making around open-space reserve management, long-term conservation planning, and policy measures in the long term, thus contributing to on-the-ground conservation impact.