Promising Practices
The Promising Practices database informs professionals and community members about documented approaches to improving community health and quality of life.
The ultimate goal is to support the systematic adoption, implementation, and evaluation of successful programs, practices, and policy changes. The database provides carefully reviewed, documented, and ranked practices that range from good ideas to evidence-based practices.
Learn more about the ranking methodology.
Peers Reaching Out and Modeling Intervention Strategies (PROMISE) (Texas, Colorado, California, New York, Washington)
Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Immunizations & Infectious Diseases, Urban
Goal: The goal of Community PROMISE is to encourage HIV prevention practices.
Impact: PROMISE leads to significant community-wide progress toward consistent HIV risk reduction.
Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Mental Health & Mental Disorders, Children, Teens
Goal: The Penn Resiliency Program is a depression prevention program that seeks to reduce the longevity of symptoms exhibited and the severity of symptoms at onset of depression, through cognitive-behavioral therapy and problem-solving techniques.
Impact: The Penn Resiliency program shows that a group-based program seeking to prevent the initial onset of and decrease the exacerbation of depression children and teens by incorporating specific coping and problem-solving skills can reduce depressive symptoms over time.
Filed under Good Idea, Economy / Investment & Personal Finance
Goal: The purpose of the Task Force was to:
1. identify and explore current and proposed strategies for
- building incomes and assets for working families;
- promoting financial education and literacy; and
- protecting working families from predatory and abusive financial services;
2. maximize the coordination of programs that affect working families and create an environment in which they can work together with greater effectiveness and impact;
3. work with charitable foundations, local government agencies, advocacy groups, community and religious leaders, academia, policy and research organizations, and other entities as may be appropriate, to carry out the purpose of the Task Force.
Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Adolescent Health, Teens
Goal: The long-term goals of the program are to arrest the development of teen antisocial behaviors and drug experimentation. Intermediate goals are to improve parents' family management and communication skills.
Impact: Parents had improved feelings toward their children and were less likely to react negatively to their children's behavior and less likely to take a "lax" approach to their children after participating in the program. They also showed improvements in the skill areas of tracking and reinforcing behavior, setting expectations and defining problems, and remaining calm in stressful situations. Antisocial behaviors in their children decreased significantly, measures of child adjustment showed improvement, and total problem behavior decreased. Furthermore, the PFS intervention resulted in significantly less use of tobacco, alcohol, and marijuana.
Filed under Good Idea, Health / Wellness & Lifestyle, Children, Teens, Adults
Goal: The mission of the Pride Alliance Network is to promote and support equality and acceptance for all people without regard to sexual orientation or gender identity.
Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Mental Health & Mental Disorders, Children, Families, Urban
Goal: The goals of this program are to detect school adjustment difficulties, prevent social and emotional problems, and enhance learning skills of children in kindergarten through third grade.
Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Community / Social Environment, Children, Urban
Goal: The goal of Prime Time Palm Beach County is to improve the quality of school-age afterschool programs through assessment, guidance, and support.
Impact: Based on the 2009 study findings, Prime Time's Quality Improvement System resulted in improvements made to afterschool programs which enhanced quality programming and important developmental learning experiences for youth.
Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Older Adults, Older Adults
Goal: The goal of the PEARLS program is to provide home-based counseling in order to manage and treat depression among older adults.
Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Adolescent Health, Teens, Racial/Ethnic Minorities
Goal: To reduce HIV risk behaviors among adolescents aged 11 to 14.
Impact: This program effectively modified sexual risk among adolescents aged 11 to 14 by focusing students on positive future selves.
Filed under Good Idea, Health / Physical Activity, Families, Racial/Ethnic Minorities, Urban
Goal: The goal of Project CAFE is to identify ways to increase access and availability of healthy foods in Los Angeles neighborhoods in order to decrease obesity and diabetes.