The following bulletin includes information regarding the Well Connected Communities initiative for the week of June 22, 2020:
In this Edition
- WCC Health Action Plans
- Q2 Reporting
- PD Calendar
- Youth Leadership Resources
- News, Research, and Resources from the Field
WCC Health Action Plans
- The new date for communities to submit their draft action plans to Shay McNeil(smcneil@fourhcouncil.edu) is July 15, 2020. We hope that this added time will allow you and your community coalitions the time and space to develop your action plans. Please ensure that youth are engaged as equal partners as you work through and draft your action plans. Also, we ask that you continue to keep us posted on your progress as well as any challenges you may be experiencing as that will help us to provide appropriate technical assistance and support. We shall continue to monitor the situation and keep you informed of any changes.
RWJF Culture of Health Blog, 21 Jan. 2020
We combed through our research and identified the top five things your community can do to thrive in the next decade:
- Set a shared vision
- Use big data locally
- Practice resiliency
- Foster radical collaboration
- Lift up marginalized communities
Set your community up for success by taking on one or more of these strategies to promote health equity.
Q2 Reporting
- The Q2 report is due June 30, 2020. There are three components to the reporting. Each participating community will submit a community report (submitted here), and each LGU will submit one financial report (submitted through WebGrants) and one Tobacco Separation Protocol staff validation (emailed to smcneil@fourhcouncil.edu).
Please refer to the email “Reminder Q2 Reporting Due 6/30” that was sent June 17, 2020 for more information on how to submit your Q2 report. Included in that email are a sample completed community report, a TSP validation letter template, and a Q2 FAQ document.
PD Calendar
- Dialogue as a Change Tool: Understanding Community Needs Peer Circles – 2 Part Series
June 23, 2020, 1:00 – 2:00 PM ET – This Week! Please register here for the first part (June 23) of this two-part peer circle.
July 15, 2020, 1:00 – 2:00 PM ET – Please register here for the second part (July 15) of this two-part peer circle.
Recommended for WCC field staff, valuable addition for master volunteers.
Building the civic muscle needed for creating change starts by listening deeply to one another. Learn more about the practice of dialogue for building relationships, learning together, and understanding community needs. Across the two peer circle sessions you’ll build/on your foundational understanding of the practice of dialogue, create an opportunity to host a (virtual) session in your community, and return to reflect on what you heard and learned.
- Youth-Adult Volunteer Leadership Team Office Hours – Building and Maintaining Your CV (Cohort of Volunteers)
July 20 at 1:00 – 2:30 PM ET
Your Cohort of Volunteers is very important to this work, but don’t forget about your other CV in the process! Trained volunteers can not only help advance Extension education in your communities but they can also help advance your Extension career. In addition to answering your questions about master health volunteers, youth involvement, youth-adult partnerships, and other WCC matters, we will also discuss incorporating your work with and through volunteers into your professional documents. Although the main theme of the 90-minute ZOOM session will be “Building and Maintaining Your CV (Cohort of Volunteers)” questions of any kind related to Youth Leadership, Youth-Adult Partnerships and the Master Volunteer Program are welcomed.
Youth Voice and Leadership
- Youth-Adult Partnership Self-Assessment Rubric for Out-of-School Time
Does your WCC Community need to assess the strength of its Youth-Adult Partnerships (YAP)? Maybe YAP has been around for a while in theory, but are the relationships within your community authentic? YAP fosters youth leadership and engagement, requirements of the Wave 2 WCC. Attached is a rubric from Michigan State University that will help your community see where it stands with YAP. It is based on the work of Dr. Shep Zeldin who stands as an international authority in YAP. This rubric is designed to do the following:
- To formalize the concepts of youth-adult partnership in youth settings
- To be used as a low-stake peer/self-assessment tool for strengthening youth-adult partnership practices
- To be used as a formative or summative evaluation tool for assessing the structures and processes of youth-adult partnership in youth settings
It captures the four critical elements of YAP: (1) authentic decision-making, (2) natural mentors, (3) reciprocity, and (4) community connectedness.
News, Research and Resources from the Field:
Black Americans are dying from COVID-19 at more than double the rate of other groups, which experts say is due in part to pollution in Black communities.
Wed., June 24, 2020, 3:00 p.m., EDT, Register here.
Join the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy and Senior Administration Officials for a virtual launch of the Rural Community Toolbox website, a new resource for rural communities that will serve as a clearinghouse for funding and resources to support rural leaders in building strong, healthy, and drug-free communities.
- NEW Rural Resilience
Farming is a stressful job — even in good times. Farm Credit recognizes the COVID-19 outbreak and resulting economic turmoil have only added to farmers’ and ranchers’ stress. To help producers cope, Farm Credit created a free online farm stress training course for farmers and rural community members in partnership with the American Farm Bureau Federation, National Farmers Union, Michigan State University Extension and University of Illinois Extension. The partnership was initially launched on Capitol Hill last December, and today, we’re pleased to announce this free online Rural Resilience course, originally available to Farm Bureau and Farmers Union members, is now available to everyone.
Our organizations will host a virtual press briefing Tuesday, June 23 at 9 a.m. EDT, to discuss our collaboration and the Rural Resilience course. Please join if you are interested in learning more. Click here to register.
Speakers:
- Todd Van Hoose, President and CEO, Farm Credit Council
- Zippy Duvall, President, American Farm Bureau Federation
- Mike Stranz, Vice President of Advocacy, National Farmers Union
- Cheryl Eschbach, Director of the Health and Nutrition Institute, Michigan State University Extension
- Courtney Cuthbertson, Assistant Professor and Extension Specialist, Department of Human Development and Family Studies, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
To register for the training and learn more about Farm Credit’s commitment to farmers’ and ranchers’ wellbeing, visitfarmcredit.com/rural-resilience.
From ChangeLab Solutions
The legal concept of preemption may have little resonance outside of courts and legislative chambers, but what it describes — the authority of a higher level of government to limit, or even eliminate, the power of a lower level of government to regulate an issue — has profound significance for public health.
From RWJF
Residents of Broward County, Florida, are working together to heal the wounds of racism and achieve health equity for everyone. It’s one of the many reasons they won the RWJF Culture of Health Prize. If your community is working to tackle health equity obstacles, consider a few tangible lessons that helped Broward County achieve lasting change:
- Racism is a public health crisis that puts the entire community’s health at risk, not just people of color. Addressing systemic racism must be a part of the conversation.
- Look closely at the achievement and education gaps in your community. The process could be the problem.
- Use a racial equity lens to improve outcomes in such areas as health, economic well-being, and mental health-and apply it to policy decisions.
The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) provides data on social and economic factors that contribute to poor health outcomes in communities of color. A separate issue brief from SAMHSA presents recent data on the prevalence of opioid misuse and death in the Black/African American population.
The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) released a brief for state and local leaders with considerations for health equity in the public health response to the pandemic.