Centre for Health
Promotion
University of Toronto
The Banting Institute
100 College Street, Rm 207
Toronto, ON
M5G 1L5
Tel: 416-978-1809
Fax: 416-971-1365
centre.healthpromotion@utoronto.ca
To subscribe to the email version, contact us at centre.healthpromotion@utoronto.ca.
This is my first opportunity to present remarks about the Centre for Health Promotion as the Acting Director. Filling Irv's shoes has been a challenge, particularly on a part-time basis. I have continued my responsibilities as Co-ordinator of the Canadian Consortium for Health Promotion Research half time until the end of October. In November I will be able to devote myself full-time to the Centre. It is a thrill to be engaged in the Centre as Acting Director and I have every intention of continuing to build the Centre in many of the directions it is known for.
For those of you who do not know me, I have a strong background in planning and evaluation and I have worked in public health and health promotion for 20 years. When I was with the Ontario Ministry of Health, I was involved in producing the Podborski Report, "Health Promotion Matters" and the Spasoff Report, "Health for All Ontario". Then as health planner with the City of Toronto Department of Public Health, I helped to figure out how to implement the Healthy Toronto report using a zero-based planning and budgeting system. In these endeavours, I focused on using participatory processes that involved the public or the staff in gathering information or planning. When I became Co-Director with Irv of the North York Community Health Promotion Research Unit, I began to explore ways to improve academic, public
health practitioner, and community partnerships in research. I also conducted some research projects to fill the gap in positive indicators of health promotion success, such as indicators of empowerment and community capacity. Over the last few years, I have been the Co-ordinator of the Canadian Consortium for Health Promotion Research and a free-lance consultant in participatory, community-based evaluation and research projects.
Since the beginning of July, I have been learning about financial systems and personnel requirements, as well as making contacts with friends of the Centre. It has been a great opportunity to meet new people and old friends. For financial reasons, Joanne Lacey, Information Officer for the Centre, has moved over to the Health Communication Unit. This will leave a gap in Centre membership support services like our database, the newsletter, the annual report and the annual general meeting. Please be patient as we all adjust over the next few months until the future picture for the Centre is developed. We will still produce an Annual Report and have an Annual General Meeting this fall – please see the announcement in this newsletter.
As mentioned elsewhere in this newsletter, the Task Force to look at the future direction for the Centre and its long-term financial footing under the chairmanship of Ilze Kalnins has been set up. I am looking forward to working with this group to think creatively about the future possibilities for the Centre. To help me and the Task Force, I am seeking as much input as possible from others. I will be meeting regularly with the Centre s Unit directors to get their views. I will be holding a special meeting in November for any staff and consultants hired on Centre projects to give me their views. It would also be important to hear from Associates, Members and friends of the Centre and this will be done in two ways. All of you are invited to answer the questions listed below and send them to me by email over the next month or so. In addition, I will be setting up the AGM as an opportunity to exchange views and discuss what you want to see in the future for the Centre. I welcome all of your views and I look forward to some thinking work at the AGM.
All the best and I look forward to meeting more of you over the months ahead.
Suzanne Jackson, Acting Director
Task Force on Future Direction of The Centre for Health Promotion
Harvey Skinner has appointed a Task Force to examine options for sustaining the Centre for Health Promotion over the long term. Over the next few months, this group, under the leadership of Ilze Kalnins, will review the current funding and resource base for the Centre, and look for options to sustain core funding for the Centre. The list of members follows.
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Ilze Kalnins, Chair
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Suzanne Jackson, CHP Acting Director
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David Korn, PHS Faculty
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Roberta Ferrence, Director, Ontario Tobacco Research Unit
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Peter Coleridge, Centre for Addiction and Mental Health
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John Garcia/Terry Sullivan, Cancer Care Ontario
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Jim Armstrong, Wellesley-Central Foundation
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Liz Jansen, Toronto Public Health Department
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Connie Clement, Ontario Prevention Clearing House
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Adrienne Chin, Alumni
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Barry MacDonald, CHP Business Officer
As one contribution to the work of this Task Force, Suzanne Jackson is very interested in hearing from friends of the Centre about activities you think should be the focus of the Centre over the next 5 to 10 years. Please feel free to talk to Suzanne about your views at any time. Your in-put is desired!
We would appreciate your views in response to the following questions:
1. What does the Centre do well? What is it known for?
2. What could the Centre improve?
3. What focus(es) do you think would carry the Centre forward over the next 10-15 years?
4. What suggestions do you have about financing the Centre?
Thank you for your views. Please return your responses to suzanne.jackson@utoronto.ca.
SJ
Welcome to the new version of Information Update, CHP-EInfo-Update. We will continue to bring you news from the Centre and the health promotion world at large but in a different format. We have actually been publishing an electronic version of Information Update for a few years now, but this has been on an “opt in” basis while we continued to produce our print version. Unfortunately, the costs of producing that document several times a year continued to grow and it was no longer feasible for us financially.
It is our hope that E-Info-Update will be published more frequently and the news is therefore more likely to be current and relevant. This is not the only change, however. We will no longer publish conferences and events for organizations other than the Centre and its internal units. Many if these events are already published in the OHPE Bulletin and so it is felt that there is simply some duplication of effort there. We will, however, continue to publish conferences, workshops and meetings of the Centre for Health Promotion’s Interest Groups.
JTL
It has been a busy summer here at the Centre. First, we would like to extend a warm welcome to our new “hall-mates”, the new Canadian Institutes for Health Research (CIHR) Chair in Population and Public Health headed up by longtime Associate of the Centre, John Frank, and the CIHR Chair in Aboriginal Health lead by Jeff Reading. Both Institutes bring with them many friends, associates and former colleagues of the Centre for Health Promotion, the Department of Public Health Sciences, and affiliated organizations. Our new neighbours will be a welcome change from the now departed pathology museum, more affectionately known to CHP staffers as the “sundry body parts collection”.
Which brings us to our next bit of news. Because the CIHR Chairs did not wish to just move in with the “parts”, extensive renovations have taken place here at 100 College over the summer, complete with drilling, crashing, hammering, fumes, and lots and lots of dust. Most of those renovations were for the offices of the Population & Public Health and the Aboriginal Health, and so the Centre did not reap a direct benefit. However, we do have a bright new hallway, complete with fresh paint, lights that actually work, and a matching set of floor tiles. We also have a beautiful new burgundy coloured door to usher our guests into the Centre’s main offices. It is a welcome sight after the “summer under seige”.
We also have new faces to go with our new look at the Centre. Jesse Russell joined the National Crime Prevention Centre Community Mobilisation Program during the summer. Barbara Ronson has left the project, but Ayesha Ali, formerly of our Health Communication Unit, and Christine O’Rourke, our summer intern, will be job-sharing Barbara’s spot on the project. Finally, as the Centre did not have the funds to support the position of Information Offier, Joanne Lacey will be moving to The Health Communication Unit as of this week. We wish everyone all the best!
JTL
CHP 11th Annual General Meeting
Mark your calendars now! The Centre for Health Promotion’s 11th Annual General Meeting will be held on Thursday, December 6th at Croft Chapter House, University College, 15 King’s College Circle, University of Toronto, from 3 to 5 pm. Further details and announcements will follow as the event approaches.
JTL
Nomination forms are now available for the Annual Healthy UofT Award. Past recipients have included The Vegetarium Café, Professor Carol Rodgers of the Faculty of Physical Education and Health, the United Steelworkers of America Local 1998, Health & Safety Committee, and the Environmental Studies (ENV421) class of 1999. The award will be presented at the Centre for Health Promotion Annual General Meeting on Thursday, December 6, 2001. Copies of the Award Nomination Form are available from the Centre, via email from Suzanne Jackson at suzanne.jackson@utoronto.ca.
JTL
2002 Health Promotion Summer School
Yes, there will be a 2002 Health Promotion Summer School and it will be in Toronto! Further details will be posted on the Centre for Health Promotion Website at www.utoronto.ca/chp. The tentative date is June 24 – 28, 2002 at the Bank of Montreal Institute for Learning, Toronto, Ontario. In the meantime, if you have questions, you may contact the HPSS Project Manager at C.Stanton@aci.on.ca .
CS
Announcing THCU’s Winter Series…
To Register, please fill out an online form at http://www.thcu.ca/workshopsandevents.htm#4 or call 416-978-0522.
1. Policy Development
November 19 & 20, 2001
Nancy Dubois and Brian Hyndman, The Health Communication Unit
This workshop is intended for public and community health practitioners with an interest in policy as a strategy for bringing about health promoting change. It will provide a practical, ‘hands-on’ orientation to the process of developing and implementing health-promoting policies. Topics addressed in the workshop will include: assessing the need for policy, building support for policy among key stakeholder groups, writing policies, evaluating the impact of policies, and sustaining policy over time. Through a combination of lectures, small group exercises and guest speakers, the workshop will address the development of community-wide policies (e.g., smoke-free public places), as well as the development of policies for specific settings, such as workplaces and schools.
2. Interactive Health Communication
How To’s
February 25 & 26, 2002
Larry Hershfield, The Health Communication Unit
This workshop will be of interest to those who contribute to the development of web sites, as well as those seeking increased personal skills related to the Internet. The session will deal with interactive health communication from the general to the very specific. We will begin with general issues such as how to manage the quality of information on the WWW and how to evaluate sites. We will then look at potential uses, focusing on building online communities. As with issues, use will be considered relative to Health Promotion values and strategies as outlined in the Ottawa Charter. We will then move on to more specific skills such as searching for information on the WWW (including bibliographic searches) and developing web sites.
3. Special Topics Workshop-Day One
January 28, 2002, Morning Session
Tools of Change: Integrating and Applying Social Marketing Best
Practices|
Jay Kassirer, B.Sc. MBA
Want a quick and easy way to start or enhance your organization’s social marketing activities? How about proven methods for improving your program’s impact and cost effectiveness? Join us for this three-hour workshop, and you will get a brief introduction to social marketing, a step-by-step planning methodology, a toolkit of proven techniques, and a free social marketing web site that can support and keep you up-to-date after the workshop. You will also have an opportunity to apply what you learn to your own programs.
4. Special Topics Workshop-Day One
January 28, 2002, Afternoon Session
Ethics in Social Marketing and Health Communications
François Lagarde, Social Marketing and Communications Consultant
Do the ends always justify the means? Is some exaggeration acceptable to get your audience’s attention? Are you able to answer questions, such as “Who are you to tell people what to do?” Have you chosen a population segment based on real needs or because it will be the easiest one for you to reach? What should you do if your results show that you have done more harm than good? Most social marketing and health communications projects give rise to ethical dilemmas related to either the ends being pursued or the possible strategies and tactics used to achieve them. Issues are often raised during the course of a project by project managers, board members, senior management, colleagues, clients, audience members, community groups, partners, the media, opponents to the cause, or even by your friends, children or partner. This workshop will provide ways to identify ethical dilemmas and consider practical solutions.
5. Special Topics Workshop-Day Two
January 29, 2002, Morning Session
Adapting and Spreading Best Practices
James W. Dearing, Associate Professor of Communication at Michigan State
University
This workshop is intended for program managers, funders of change initiatives, and staff in the position of selecting from program alternatives. The session will focus on the purposive use of diffusion of innovation theory to select, adapt, and spread best practices in health promotion and disease prevention to avoid “reinventing the wheel” without due cause. We will identify the diffusion concepts most usable as purposive strategies, demonstrate their application to real-world programs, and concentrate on strategies for successfully encouraging others to adopt programs that have been shown to work. Tracking or measurement of diffusion results will also be covered.
6. Special Topics Workshop-Day Two
January 29, 2002, Afternoon Session
A Continuous Quality Improvement Approach to Evaluation
Barb Van Maris, Smaller World Communications
This workshop will be of interest to evaluators seeking to increase the acceptance and application of evaluations, as well as project team leaders and members wanting to do the same. A continuous quality improvement (CQI) approach to evaluation uses both process and outcome evaluation but interprets results in a formative manner to guide further program development. Using this approach, evaluation becomes an ongoing feedback loop integrated into program development. Some of the advantages to this approach include: quality improvement is a less threatening concept to staff than evaluation; CQI focuses on learning as opposed to a succeed/fail dichotomy; A CQI approach can be more effective in attaining continued funding because it uses evaluation results to drive improvement planning; and funders can be clearly shown what improvements will be made as a result of continued or increased funding. The presenters will discuss the ideas of leading organizational development and quality improvement innovators like Scholtes, Demming, and Nolan and provide examples of how they have applied them to their evaluation practice.
JT
CHP EInfo Update
Centre for Health Promotion
University of Toronto
100 College Street, Suite 207
Toronto, ON M5G 1L5
Phone: 416-978-1809
Fax: 416-971-1365
http://www.utoronto.ca/chp
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The Centre for Health Promotion, Last updated: 06/26/02