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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.

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Breathe Better Air at School (South Carolina)

Filed under Good Idea, Environmental Health / Air, Children, Teens, Adults

Goal: The Breathe Better Air at School Program aims to educate parents, staff, bus drivers, and faculty about the importance of not idling vehicles on campus.

Brevard County Volunteer Dental Clinic (Brevard County, FL)

Filed under Effective Practice, Health / Oral Health

Goal: The goal of this program is to provide timely intervention and oral health service delivery to the stated population in order to reduce impact on local emergency departments and elevate the oral health care of Brevard's low-income citizens.

BRI Care Consultation

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Older Adults, Older Adults

Goal: BRI Care Consultation is an intervention for adults with a chronic physical or mental health condition or disability and a primary caregiver (family member or friend) who assists the adult with daily activities, tasks, and healthrelated discussions.

Bridging the Gap (Seattle)

Filed under Effective Practice, Community / Transportation, Urban

Goal: The nine-year goals of Bridging the Gap are to:
* Reduce the infrastructure maintenance backlog.
* Pave and repair Seattle streets.
* Make seismic upgrades to the most vulnerable bridges.
* Improve pedestrian and bicycle safety and create safe routes to schools.
* Increase transit speed and reliability.

Bridging the Gap: Youth Violence Reduction (Richmond)

Filed under Good Idea, Health / Prevention & Safety, Children, Teens, Families, Racial/Ethnic Minorities, Urban

Goal: To develop a useful, sustainable and replicable model designed to reduce the risk of re-injury and mortality in Richmond area youths who have been previously hospitalized with violence related injuries including gunshot wounds, stab wounds, and assault injuries.

Building Educated Leaders for Life (BELL) (Selected communities in the U.S.)

Filed under Good Idea, Education / Student Performance K-12, Children, Urban

Goal: BELL exists to transform the academic achievements, self-confidence, and life trajectories of children living in under-resourced, urban communities.

Impact: Students enrolled in summer courses may read more books during the summer than students not enrolled in summer courses.

Building Effective Programs for Summer Learning (USA)

Filed under Good Idea, Art & Recreation, Children, Racial/Ethnic Minorities

Goal: The goal of the paper is to introduce effective practices for building a summer learning program that reaches the neediest kids, gets kids learning, and keeps going strong.

Building Organizational Capacity to Advance Health Equity (Davidson County, TN)

Filed under Good Idea, Community / Governance, Racial/Ethnic Minorities

Goal: The mission of the Metro Public Health Department is to protect and improve the health and well-being of all people in Metropolitan Nashville.

Impact: Metro Public Health Department of Nashville/Davidson County has implemented department-wide strategies to address existing health inequities.

California Green Jobs Corps (Sacramento)

Filed under Good Idea, Economy / Employment, Teens

Goal: The goal of the California Green Corps is to place 1,000 at-risk young adults between the ages of 16 and 24 into "green" jobs in order to stimulate the economy and provide opportunities for disadvantaged youth while improving and protecting the environment.

Cany Valley Agape Network Family for Rural Healthy Food Access

Filed under Effective Practice, Health / Nutrition & Healthy Eating, Rural

Goal: CVAN is the Kansas conduit for tons of healthy produce from the Catholic Charities Mary Martha Organization--the steward of excess highly perishable high quality foods from a huge Walmart Distribution Center in Oklahoma. As food supplies allow, CVAN distributes to the 100 square mile school district and to share with a networked family of pantries and volunteer organizations in five Kansas counties and South Coffeyville, OK. As needed, CVAN has recruited distribution volunteers in covering communities within this economically depressed region. The network family was built upon the CVAN’s supply of fresh produce, but is now blessing this area with distribution of CARES foods during the COVID crisis. Its volunteers are food warriors--winning in the fight against rural hunger.

An Effective Practice meets the following HCI criteria:

  1. The program description includes at a minimum: the sponsoring organization, program goals, program implementation steps, and outcomes that have demonstrated program success and/or promise in achieving the program goal in one or more localities.
  2. The results from an evaluation of the program include quantitative measures of improvement in outcome of interest (i.e. increase in voter registration, not just delivery of voter registration drive) and/ or the outcome measure is increased or improved compared to the baseline measurement or the control group but the difference is not statistically significant.

A Good Idea meets the following HCI criteria:

  1. The program description includes: the sponsoring organization, program goals, program funding source, program implementation steps and outcomes.
  2. The program evaluation is limited to descriptive measure(s) of success/accomplishment (i.e., program participation rates, number of services/education sessions/radio messages provided). Note: oftentimes, the program has been newly implemented and a program evaluation has not yet been conducted. Programs that have not yet been evaluated, but which show promise in improving health or quality of life, are classified as Good Ideas until an evaluation is conducted.

An Evidence-Based Practice meets the following HCI criteria:

  1. The program description includes at a minimum: the sponsoring organization, program goals, program implementation steps, and outcomes that have demonstrated program success in achieving the program goal in one or more localities.
  2. The results from an evaluation of the program include quantitative measures showing improvement in the outcome(s) of interest after the implementation of the program (i.e. increase in smoking cessation, not just the delivery of a smoking cessation program). The outcome measure(s) is/are compared at relevant time periods before and after the intervention or program implementation. Alternatively, the evaluation study compares the outcome(s) between an intervention group and an appropriate control group.
  3. The study is of peer-review quality and presents numbers in a scientific manner; measurements of precision and reliability are included (e.g. confidence intervals, standard errors), results from statistical tests show a significant difference or change in the outcome measure(s), and relevant point estimates and p-values are presented. Note: if the results from an evaluation of a program are presented in a scientific manner and the outcome measure is improved compared to the baseline measurement or the control group but the difference is not statistically significant, the practice is classified as effective and not evidence-based.

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