LI Course
CE Hours: 3 contact hours

Partnership: Community-based Public Health (CBPH) Caucus of APHA

Statement of Purpose and Institute Overview: The purpose of this Institute is to increase the knowledge and strengthen the skills of community health advocates, planners, and policy leaders about how to integrate collaborative community policy design into community-based health partnerships including (but not restricted to) those that pursue community-based participatory research (CBPR). The Community-Based Public Health (CBPH) Caucus is guided by the principle that community lies at the heart of public health, and that interventions work best when they are rooted in the values, knowledge, expertise, and interests of the community itself. Effective health interventions are driven by the power of equitable partnerships between community-based organizations, academic institutions, and health agencies organized to build on the strengths of community. CBPR was identified by the IOM as one of eight new areas in which all public health schools should provide training. This reflects the recognition that traditional expert-driven approaches to public health have often been poorly suited to developing community interventions aimed at addressing many of today's most intractable health problems, including inequities. CBPR has developed as an approach to community-partnered research that aims to ensure equitable participation of community and university members in all aspects of a community research project, while also ensuring a balance between the achievement of research and community action goals. CBPR has provided a productive framework for establishing sustainable relationships between researchers and community members, building trust, and conducting innovative research and policy work. However, as community health partnerships have struggled to focus more directly on achieving action and policy objectives, certain gaps between the ideals of CBPR and the capacity for engaging policy change goals have become obvious. Experts in collaborative policy design training and policy advocacy, with rich experience in on-the-ground community-based participatory partnerships, will lead this learning institute, which will be structured to engage active participation and questions throughout. Based on research as well as direct experience, this institute will explore how collaborative policy design can provide an empowering bridge between research and action. By engaging participants in active dialogue, the institute will also help participants understand how to navigate that bridge, by educating participants on the continuum of community-engaged research and policy advocacy, and on the need to fit different structures of partnership to different kinds of community action/research objectives. This institute will also explore some potential dangers for community partnerships that do not pay sufficient attention to the equitable structuring of power relationships.

Session Objectives: 1. Identify core principles of community-based participatory research (CBPR) 2. Explain the continuum of community engagement within which any community health partnership must be structured 3. Analyze how to structure community-based partnerships to achieve community policy objectives 4. Match the appropriate balance of research, policy, and action objectives with the appropriate structure of community partnership

CE Credits: Medical (CME), Health Education (CHES), Nursing (CNE), Public Health (CPH)