Recorded presentation

James William Brown, PhD, MS, HCLD, Dean, Health Sciences and Human Performance, Ocean City College, College Dr., Toms River, NJ 08754-2001, 732-255-0395, jbrown@ocean.edu

A public health workforce crisis is emerging in New Jersey. The current workforce is rapidly aging and nearing retirement and there are few students and young professionals who are interested in careers at public health agencies. This is resulting in a critical narrowing of the public health workforce pipeline. The New Jersey Public Health Association mobilized to highlight this problem at its annual meeting and sponsored a statewide-symposium bringing together stakeholders to identify and discuss new strategies for dealing with the public health workforce crisis. The stakeholders included representatives of public health academic programs (including vocational schools, county colleges, etc.), the public and private public health employers, the New Jersey Department of Health and Senior Services, high school and college guidance and career counselors, and students interested in public health careers (at the high school, college, and graduate levels). The goal of the symposium was to: 1. Identify and discuss new strategies for increasing the number of New Jersey high school, undergraduate and graduate students interested in public health careers; 2. Identify and discuss the relevance of public health training programs in New Jersey to workplace realities; and 3. Establish lines of communication between those entities that prepare public health workers and those who employ them: academic, private and governmental. Strategies discussed included: reaching out to school-aged children to spark interest in the public health profession; using information technology to recruit new public health workers; and providing incentives designed to encourage improvement of skills.

Learning Objectives:

• 1. To identify the factors that have led New Jersey to a public health workforce crisis.
• 2. To describe the process used by the New Jersey Public Health Association to bring stakeholders together.
• 3. To develop a strategy to address public health workforce issues in his or her area.

Presenting author's disclosure statement:
I do not have any significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.

Recorded presentation