Centre for Health Promotion
University of Toronto
Health Sciences Building
155 College Street, Suite 400
Toronto, ON
M5T 3M7
Tel: 416-978-1809
Fax: 416-971-1365
centre.healthpromotion@utoronto.ca

  E-info Update Fall 2005

Contents

To subscribe to the email version, contact us at mailto:centre.healthpromotion@utoronto.ca.


Director’s Remarks

It has been an eventful summer. In June 2005, the Ontario Health Promotion Summer School brought 150 people together and it was a special treat to have two Mapuche people from the Andes mountains in Chile come as part of the Aboriginal stream, as well as others from Chile and Bermuda. Although the Summer School is not billed as an international event, it is always a tremendous learning opportunity to exchange with others. In July, the Centre partnered with the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) to sponsor the International Mental Health Promotion Summer Institute which brought about 100 people from all over the world together with a world class group of speakers for discussion on mental health promotion. This was a golden opportunity to beef up the interest of the Centre in mental health promotion. As a result, Andrea Stevens-Lavigne (from CAMH) and I have been invited to conduct a week-long course in mental health promotion at the summer school sponsored on by the School of Public Health at the University of Chile in Santiago in January 2006. Among other international activities, the Centre was represented at the 6th World Health Organization (WHO) Conference on Health Promotion in Bangkok by me, Fran Perkins, Erika Khandor and Lauren Cordwell as we presented one of the technical background papers at the conference on the Ottawa Charter on Health Promotion strategies. Further details about this are described later in the newsletter.

Nationally, I have been very involved in the process to create national health goals for Canada. Minister Carolyn Bennett initiated a series of consultations across Canada to gather input from the public health field and citizens about health goals. With Jan Roberts (ED for the Canadian Society for International Health), I was involved as a facilitator for five consultations and sat on the Goals Statement Drafting Committee over the month of August. I was particularly impressed with the way that people across the country consistently focused on the determinants of health as a basis for the goals. The draft goals are still going through the approval process but I am very hopeful that we will have a set of national goals by the beginning of 2006. The next task will be to draft specific objectives and targets for each province and territory. In other national activities and in partnership with the Ontario Prevention Clearinghouse (OPC), I was involved in providing training in health promotion for staff of the national affiliates of the Canadian Health Network (CHN). I think it is very significant that there is a renewed commitment to health promotion at the CHN, and the health promotion affiliate (OPC and CHP) is providing assistance to bring consistency in approach to all affiliates.

In addition to the other news that you can read about in the newsletter, the Centre and THCU have moved from 100 College St. to 155 College St., the Health Sciences Building and home of Public Health Sciences, Health Policy and Management, and Nursing. Although there were many disruptions, the Centre staff worked very hard to make sure the move was as smooth as possible. Many thanks to Nora, Cathy and Barry. You must come and visit us for our open house in December and see our new space!

-- Suzanne F. Jackson, Director

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News from the Centre

This past summer was a very busy one for the staff at the Centre for Health Promotion and The Health Communication Unit, as we prepared to leave our home in the Banting Institute and move to our new location down the street.

Our efforts paid off, the move happened in September, and we are now comfortable ensconced in our new set of offices. Our new address is:

Health Sciences Building
155 College Street, Suite 400
Toronto, ON M5T 3M7

All staff email addresses and phone numbers remain the same.

Drop in any time! And join us for our office warming/holiday get-together in December (invitations to be sent our next month).

Healthy U of T Awards 2005 – Call for Nominations

The Centre is now accepting nominations for the annual Healthy U of T Awards. The Awards recognize individuals, departments or organizations within the University of Toronto (student, student group, staff or faculty) that have made a substantial and long lasting healthy difference to the University of Toronto community, creating social and environmental conditions that promote the health and well-being of others on campus.

The deadline for nominations is Thursday, November 3, 2005. For nomination forms and additional information, please contact the Centre at (416) 978-2182 or visit our website at www.utoronto.ca/chp/.

Last year, the 2004 Healthy U of T Individual Award was presented to Mike Peterson, staff person with Computer and Network Services who has been volunteer coordinator of the Graduate Student Union Volleyball League for 25 years. The League is open campus wide and welcomes not only graduate students, but staff, faculty and undergraduates as well. The Group Healthy U of T Award 2005 went to the UTM/Evergreen Naturalization Steering Committee in recognition of the work they do in creating a healthy and natural environment at the University of Mississauga campus, and their inclusion of campus members in their initiatives.

Annual General Meeting 2005

When: Thursday, December 1, 2005 at 4:00 p.m.
Where: Croft Chapter House, University College, 15 King’s College Circle, UofT
Who can come: Fellows and members of the CHP, friends, colleagues, anyone interested in
health promotion
Guest Speaker: Irv Rootman, Former Director and current Fellow of the Centre for Health Promotion
RSVP: Nora Sellers, (416) 978-2182 or at nora.sellers@utoronto.ca

This past year there have been many changes at the Centre. We have moved to a new location in the Health Sciences building, new projects, both national and international, have been initiated, new staff have been hired, new ideas have been shared. Join us at our Annual General Meeting to learn more about these activities, to hear about the Centre’s future plans, and to meet and talk with colleagues and friends.

For more information on the event, please contact Nora (see above for contact information).

See you there!

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Ontario Health Promotion Summer School (HPSS)

HPSS 2005

Each year, the Summer School offers a unique program designed to meet the needs of Anglophone, Francophone and Aboriginal health promotion practitioners. The Health Promotion Summer School 2005 was held from June 20 – 23 (Pre-School June 19) at the BMO Institute for Learning in Toronto. HPSS 2005 marked the 12th year that the Health Promotion Summer School has been offered.

Each year, the HPSS covers two key strategies of the Ottawa Charter for Health Promotion. At HPSS 2005 the themes were Strengthening Community Action («L’action communautaire») and Creating a Supportive Organizational Environment («La création d’un environnement organisationnel engagé»).

A choice of four concurrent sessions ran simultaneously throughout the Summer School, three within the theme Strengthening Community Action (Aboriginal, Francophone and general option) and one within the theme Creating a Supportive Organizational Environment (general option). Integration between participants attending workshops related to different themes was facilitated through opening and closing plenary sessions, whose focus was on the global concerns of health promotion.

The larger concurrent sessions were followed by small group sessions providing a greater in-depth and interactive exploration of the theme being explored and assisted the participants in discussing and finding ways to apply the ideas generated in the both the concurrent and plenary sessions to their own work situations.

Additionally, toolbox and personal development sessions were offered on a wide variety of topics. Social activities included a Francophone cabaret night and an Aboriginal feast complete with native performers and speakers.

The HPSS 2005 saw increased participation and enjoyed very positive feedback. We look forward to the Health Promotion Summer School 2006.

HPSS 2006

The Centre for Health Promotion is hosting its 13th annual Ontario Health Promotion Summer School in Toronto. The Summer School will once again be held at the luxurious and affordable BMO Institute for Learning between June 26 and 29, 2006. A ‘Preschool’ day of optional workshops (Health Promotion 101, Evaluation 101 and Research and Ethics) will be offered on Sunday, June 25.

This year’s theme is Creating Supportive Physical and Social Environments, and participants may choose to participate in the general, Aboriginal or Francophone stream.

A limited number of travel subsidies will be available for those participating in the French-language stream. Tuition subsidies are also available to nurses through the Registered Nurses Association of Ontario.

A range of stimulating workshops, toolbox sessions and personal development workshops will be available, as well as a variety of social and cultural events, and opportunities for professional and personal networking.

For more information about HPSS 2006 and subsidies, please contact the Summer School Coordinator, Lisa Weintraub at 416-469-4632 or at hpss@rogers.com. Our detailed web site will be up and running shortly: www.utoronto.ca/chp/hpss.

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News from The Health Communication Unit (THCU)

Upcoming THCU Events

This year, as an alternative to offering all of our four annual workshops in Toronto, we will be holding them in various locations across the province. For each two-day event we are looking for partners who will help us select a location for the workshop and promote the workshop to appropriate local organizations and individuals. All costs will be covered by THCU.

If you would like to partner with THCU to bring one of the following workshops to your region, please contact us at 416-978-0522 or hc.unit@utoronto.. We have identified preferred regions and approximate dates for each 2006 workshop, but these details may be negotiated with interested partners.

Introduction to Health Promotion Program Planning, May 2006
Eastern Region, Larry Hershfield and Heather Graham

Media Advocacy, June 2006
South West Region, Nancy Dubois

Introduction to Evaluating Health Promotion Programs, October 2006
North Region, Robb MacDonald

Making the Case, November 2006
Greater Toronto Area, Heather Graham

All workshops are free of charge for Ontario residents. For more information on the agenda for these workshops, or to find out when a specific location and date has been selected, please visit our website at http://www.thcu.ca.

THCU to Host On-Line Webinars

This Fall THCU will offer online webinars in health communication. There will be four sessions on two topics.

1. Introduction to THCU’s Online Interactive Campaign Planner will be repeated on two separate dates.

Tuesday November 15th, 2005, 9:30 - 10:30 a.m.
Tuesday December 6th, 2005, 1:30 - 2:30 p.m.

Description of session

The Campaign Planner, available at http://www.thcu.ca/infoandresources/ohc/myworkbook/login/login.asp, guides you through steps 5-7 of THCU’s 12 step process to developing health communication campaigns:

  • setting communication objectives;
  • selecting channels and vehicles; and
  • combining and sequencing events.

This handy tool allows you to create, save and print a full text summary of your campaign, as well as an attractive timeline of events. These can then be shared and modified at any time, from any computer!

During this one-hour session we will demonstrate how to use the Campaign Planner. It can be used individually, or as a working tool for a group planning a campaign.

Participants are expected to be familiar with THCU’s 12 step process to developing a health communication campaign prior to the webinare session. To learn about the 12 steps, please visit http://www.thcu.ca/infoandresources/health_communication.htm. Participants are welcome to explore the Campaign Planner in advance, and bring specific questions about the tool, to the session.

During this audio and web conference, participants will be linked by telephone and by an online application that allows us to display materials, conduct online polls and hold brief chat sessions.

Participation in the web conference series is free of charge to people who work in health promotion in Ontario. We encourage interested applicants to register as soon as possible as enrollment will be limited to 40 people. Please visit www.thcu.ca or call 416-978-0522 for information on how to register.

2. Managing the Campaign Development Process will be repeated on two separate dates.

Tuesday November 29th, 2005, 9:30 - 10:30 a.m.
Thursday December 8th, 2005, 1:30-2:30 p.m.

Description of session

This session is for individuals who would like to learn more about effectively facilitating a group through a health communication campaign planning process. THCU facilitators will provide a brief overview of some of our tools that can help you manage the campaign development process, as well as systematically and critically assess health communication products and campaigns. This will be a highly interactive session. Participants will be expected to share specific challenges they have encountered and offer advice to other participants on how they have dealt with similar situations. This session is most appropriate for individuals who are already very familiar with THCU’s 12 steps to developing a health communication campaign and have some experience with leading a group through a health communication campaign planning process. For more information about the 12 steps, please visit http://www.thcu.ca/infoandresources/health_communication.htm.

During this audio and web conference, participants will be linked by telephone and by an online application that allows us to display materials, conduct online polls and hold brief chat sessions.

Participation in the web conference series is free of charge to people who work in health promotion in Ontario. We encourage interested applicants to register as soon as possible as enrollment will be limited to 40 people. Please visit www.thcu.ca or call 416-978-0522 for information on how to register.

New THCU Associates

THCU welcomed two new associates to the team in May 2005. Robb MacDonald and Heather Graham joined THCU as consultants.

Robb MacDonald is an experienced facilitator and curriculum designer with more than 10 years of independent consulting experience with the not-for-profit and public sectors. He has worked extensively with the literacy, employment, and health fields in Ontario, assisting provincial and regional organizations to develop, implement, and evaluate their social marketing and communication programs. Robb has a particular interest working with and advocating for rural- and northern-based communities.

Heather Graham is a consultant and facilitator who has worked with a wide range of organizations and cross-sector partnerships in the institutional health, community health, and community and social service sectors. The focus of her work is in the areas of community engagement, facilitated planning, program evaluation, organizational capacity building, and partnership development. Heather is presently on maternity leave but expects to be back at work by the Spring.

THCU Website

Visit http://www.thcu.ca/ for information on upcoming events, our consultation services, and our extensive online collection of resources on health promotion planning, evaluation, communication, policy change, and sustainability. Recent updates include new editions of our What We're Reading and Fun Finds columns.

The Workplace Project

THCU’s Workplace Project is now in its 6th year of promoting comprehensive workplace health promotion to intermediaries across Ontario. The Workplace Project worked in its 5th year to create a resource that examines and recommends situational assessment tools that are effective, plausible and/or practical for implementation in Ontario workplaces. Comprehensive Workplace Health Promotion: Recommended and Promising Practices for Situational Assessment Tools is an online searchable catalogue and background resource designed to help workplace health promotion intermediaries and practitioners in Ontario to:

  • select and implement a situational assessment tool in their workplace, and
  • replicate and/or adapt the best practice methodology used to generate the tools.

To access this and other resources visit www.thcu.ca/workplace/infoandresources.

This year, the Workplace Project will be conducting another recommended practices review, this time examining and identifying recommended and promising workplace health promotion programs. The Workplace Project will also be holding a provincial meeting/learning session for workplace health promotion stakeholders in March 2006. The Workplace Project also continues to offer consultations and work with several regional networks in Ontario.

Check out the Workplace Project’s Virtual Community at www.thcu.ca/workplace/vc, which continues to provide a space for interested parties to share insights, opinions, and resources relating to supporting comprehensive workplace health promotion initiatives. Although there is no special access required to read the Virtual Community posts, if you’d like to contribute a story or resource and be updated with Virtual Community email reminders, be sure to login and create a free user account.

Hardcopy Info-packs are now available for free from the Workplace Project! This includes the Introduction to CWHP Info-pack, Influencing the Organizational Environment to Create Healthy Workplaces Info-pack, and Evaluating CWHP Info-pack. To place your order, or if you have other Workplace Project questions, comments and material requests, please contact Ali Kilbourn at workplace_admin@thcu.ca.

Ontario Health Promotion Email Bulletin

The Ontario Health Promotion E-mail Bulletin (OHPE) is a weekly newsletter for people interested in health promotion and is produced by the Ontario Prevention Clearinghouse and The Health Communication Unit. We provide information on workshops, conferences, job postings, projects, issues and resources.

If you have not already subscribed, we invite you to visit us at http://www.ohpe.ca/: learn about the newsletter, browse or search our complete archive of past issues, read our submission guidelines, and sign up online.

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News from the International Health Promotion Unit

Participatory Evaluation Resource Manual [PAHO]

The Centre has been supporting the English version of the Participatory Evaluation Resource Manual being developed by the Pan-American Health Organization (PAHO). Based on feedback from healthy community projects in Ontario and Trinidad-Tobago, the Centre volunteered to simplify the Manual to make is more community-friendly to use. Rosie Mishaiel, an MHSc student, did her summer practicum with the Centre and revised the Manual. It was retested in Trinidad-Tobago in September and the Centre is working with PAHO to make further revisions and decide the next steps. The Spanish version of this Manual is already available and the French and Portuguese versions are still being tested and developed.

Guide to Economic Evaluation in Health Promotion

This project to develop a guide to economic evaluation in health promotion has been under development with funding from Centres for Disease Control Atlanta since 2003 as a partnership between the Centre for Health Promotion and Ligia de Salazar at the Universidad de Valle in Cali, Colombia and health economists in Cuba, PAHO and Australia. In June 2005, Suzanne took on the responsibility of coordinating a major rewrite of the Guide in English in preparation for finalizing it at a meeting in December. The Guide is being written for health promotion professionals and policy-makers who need guidance about the economic evaluation process, how it works, and what to expect in application to health promotion.

Proposal in Brazil

Katia de Pinho Campos has been working with Suzanne and Reg Warren to draft a proposal to work with PAHO in Brazil and the Ministry of Health to evaluate the National Health Promotion Policy that is to be implemented in Brazil sometime this fall. The main stumbling block has been to find the right funding source.

Youth for Health II in Ukraine

After six years, this CIDA-funded Youth for Health project of the Canadian Society for International Health (CSIH) is coming to an end. The goals of the second phase of this project have exceeded expectations for the most part and it appears to be sustainable. Suzanne has been the Chair of the Canadian Advisory Board for the past year and will be going to Ukraine in October to be part of the closing events and review/evaluate it. Irv Rootman, Michael Goodstadt, Barb Ronson and Fran Perkins representing CHP took significant roles in the first phase of the Ukraine project

Youth for Health Balkans [CIDA]

Suzanne Jackson Harvey Skinner and Fran Perkins are part of a team, working with CSIH that successfully submitted a bid to the Canadian International Development Agency CIDA for a Balkans Youth and Health Project. The first phase of assessment and building partnerships is underway with the inception mission planned for February 2006. This project builds on the model that was used for The Youth and Health Projects in The Ukraine and will be developed within a primary care framework.

Visits and Exchanges

Maria Teresa Valenzuela from the School of Public Health at the University of Chile visited the Centre for three weeks in June and July. She attended both the HPSS and the Mental Health Promotion Summer Institute and worked with Suzanne on a potential joint proposal to evaluate healthy communities.

Louise Signal from University of Otago in New Zealand visited in October for one week.

Suzanne was invited to speak at a Healthy Cities Conference in Tainan, Taiwan on Measuring Community Capacity in October.

Fran Perkins was invited to speak at a Healthy Cities Conference in Seoul Korea in March where she was the keynote speaker on the theme Healthy Cities. Fran also gave a half day workshop on Healthy Public Policy.

The 6th Global Conference on Health Promotion

"Policy and Partnership for Action: Addressing the Determinants of Health", Bangkok, Thailand, 7-11 August 2005

The 6th World Health Organization (WHO) Conference on Health Promotion, organized by the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Ministry of Public Health, Thailand, was held at the United Nations Conference Centre in Bangkok, on 7-11 August 2005. This conference was the latest in the series which began in Ottawa in 1986, which produced the Ottawa Charter on Health Promotion. The benchmark Ottawa conference was followed by conferences in Adelaide (1988), Sundsvall (1991), Jakarta (1997) and Mexico-City (2000).

Almost 20 years later, many things have changed in the world, including the impact of globalization, the internet, greater moves towards private sector involvement in public health, emphasis on a sound evidence-based approach and cost effectiveness. The 6th Global Conference was convened to meet these challenges and to better exploit the opportunities presented for health promotion in the 21st century.

Several processes led up to the conference which included the development of a draft copy of The Bangkok Charter for Health Promotion and an invitational request to experts to prepare some background documents for discussion at the conference and to be available to participants as background material.

The Centre for Health Promotion, along with the Thai Health Promotion Foundation, Bangkok was invited to prepare a paper entitled Integrated Health Promotion Strategies: A Contribution to Tackling Current and Future Health Challenges. Suzanne Jackson, Fran Perkins, Erika Khandor and Lauren Cordwell as co authors were invited to attend the conference and their workshop session and paper were well received.

This was an invitation only conference and most of the world leaders in Health promotion were in attendance.\

The Bangkok Charter for Health Promotion

One of the conference's most important outcomes was The Bangkok Charter for Health Promotion. It identifies major challenges, actions and commitments needed to address the determinants of health in a globalized world by engaging the many actors and stakeholders critical to achieving health for all.

The Charter highlights the changing context of global health and the challenges faced in achieving its aims, including the growing double burden of communicable and chronic diseases which include heart disease, stroke, cancer and diabetes. There is also the need to address and harness the health effects of globalization such as widening inequities, rapid urbanization and the degradation of environments.

The Bangkok Charter gives new direction to health promotion by calling for policy coherence, investment and partnering across governments, international organizations, civil society and the private sector to work towards four key commitments. These include ensuring that health promotion is:

  • central to the global development agenda;
  • a core responsibility of all governments;
  • part of good corporate practice, and;
  • a focus of community and civil society initiatives.

The Charter was developed through an open consultation process involving participants from a wide range of groups and organizations around the globe. The discussion was concluded at the conference attended by 700 participants from more than 100 countries including leading health promotion experts, government policy makers, non-governmental organizations, health specialists and representatives from the private sector.

There was a lot of debate around the titling of “The Bangkok Charter”, as it was perceived that using the word charter would detract from the Ottawa Charter. Eventually the debate centered on content. Even though couched in bureaucratic language there are some pretty radical ideas embedded in the document; ideas such as making the promotion of health a core responsibility for all of government, developing a global treaty for health and calling for ethical and responsible business practice and fair trade.

To learn more, visit www.who.int/healthpromotion/conferences/6gchp/bangkok_charter/en/index.html.

North American Regional Office / International Union of Health Promotion and Education

The Canadian office of the North American Regional Office (NARO) for the International Union for Health Promotion and Education (IUHPE) is based at the Centre for Health Promotion.

Fran Perkins, as a Regional Co-Director for NARO, attended the Global Board meeting in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil in May of this year. NARO had a great number of leaders attending the IUHPE Global Board of Trustees who all spent dedicated time at the meeting each day and, as well, found time to enjoy the unique beauty and culture of such a famous city.

The meeting focused on progress reports regarding respective regional work plans, IUHPE headquarters activities and operational issues, IUPHE membership and leadership development, the WHO 6th Global Conference on Health Promotion in Bangkok, August 2005, the 19th World Conference on Health Promotion and Education in Vancouver, June 2007, future world conferences planning, the establishment of global networks and consortiums, and modifications to IUHPE’s global constitution and by-laws.

David McQueen of the Centers for Disease Control Atlanta provided an update on the Global Program on Health Promotion Effectiveness, which NARO is participating in, and will have updates at a later time. The Board of Trustees approved participation of IUHPE in the Global Consortium for Advancement of Promotion and Prevention in Mental Health and the establishment of an International School Health Network to be “housed” in IUHPE headquarters (pending available funding –t’was ever thus).

In 2004, IUHPE was represented at the UN Conference on Implementing Development Goals set by world leaders. Two NARO members Drs. Flora K. Bloom and Kathleen Schmalz of the U.S.A., were selected to represent IUHPE at the 57th Annual United Nations Department of Public Information/Non-Governmental Organization (NGO) Conference held at UN headquarters in New York City, September 8-10, 2004. Secretary General Kofi A. Annan addressed NGO delegates at the opening session in the General Assembly Hall. Entitled Millennium Development Goals: Civil Society Takes Action, the conference focused on the roles of NGOs, civil society and governments in the implementation of the eight Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) which were adopted by 189 UN Member States at their session in 2000.

One of our objectives is to keep IUHPE members informed of the progress made on MDGs. By stressing the importance of these goals, health educators and health promotion specialists can raise public awareness at community and national levels to understand and actively support activities which foster MDG implementation. Additional information on the conference is posted on http://www.un.org/dpi/ngosection.

IUHPE has an electronic journal, RHP&EO, edited by Michele O’Neil in Quebec. It has been a wonderful source for debate and information. Iona Kickbush and Don Nutbeam among others weigh into the debates especially those around the Bangkok Charter. RHP&EO has evolved from an English only website to a trilingual one, in the three official languages of the Union (English, French and Spanish). Go and check it out at www.rhpeo.org and do not hesitate to partake in the debate.

Following a call to all institutional members wishing to host one of the next IUHPE world conferences, two excellent propositions were made to the Board of Trustees. Both candidates were accepted and each will host a conference in the next six years. The first, in 2007, will be organized by the Canadian Consortium for Health Promotion Research (CCHPR) in Vancouver, 2007 Please check out the conference website at www.iuhpeconference.org for the latest information.

The proposed thematic orientation of the conference will be the Ottawa Charter: its principles, action strategies and the determinants of health. A major goal of the conference will be to review, reassess and determine the relevance of the Ottawa Charter in the 21st Century. It will also take into account the Bangkok Charter and the Global perspective.

The second conference will be hosted, in 2010, by the Centre for Health Education and Health Promotion from the Chinese University of Hong Kong.

Both these meeting may seem a long way away but they are well worth putting in your schedules now.

-- Fran Perkins and Suzanne F. Jackson

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News from the National Projects Unit

The major event for the National Projects Unit over the last few months relates to the awarding of the Ron Draper Health Promotion Award by the Canadian Public Health Association to the Unit’s Senior Consultant Reg Warren. This is a prestigious award and recognizes Reg’s important contributions to the field of health promotion over the last 30 years.

Reg Warren was born in the town of Tyndall, Manitoba. He attended Edward Schreyer High School, the University of Manitoba and the Paterson School of International Affairs at Carleton University. He was Director of Research for the Traffic Injury Research Foundation of Canada, and Chief of the Health Promotion Studies Unit, under Irving Rootman and Ron Draper. Reg currently is a visiting fellow at the Centre for Health Promotion, University of Toronto, an Associate of Rick Wilson Consulting, Corlett and Associates, SML and Associates, and is Associate Editor of the Canadian Journal of Public Health.

Reg has evaluated many of Canada's major health strategies, including the Canadian Drug Strategy, the Canadian Strategy on HIV/AIDS, the Canadian Breast Cancer Initiative, the National Drug Strategy, the Canadian Tobacco Demand Reduction Strategy, National Impaired Driving Strategy and the National Health Promotion Program.

He was the lead technical advisor on the Second Report on the Health of Canadians, and founding Co-Principal Investigator for the Ontario Tobacco Research Unit. He was the Project Director for Canada's first national Health Promotion Survey, which has been replicated in many other countries.

Reg has carried out research in every province and territory of Canada. He has worked on building evaluation capacity with hundreds of community groups. Reg has also worked in developing health promotion capacity in several other countries as well, including Estonia, Costa Rica, Chile and Brazil

Reg specializes in knowledge translation and in "making research results meaningful" to a broad array of user communities. He is a frequent keynote speaker at national and international events hosted by such agencies as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the World Health Organization, and the European Commission.

-- Rick Wilson

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Update on the Centre's Special Interest Groups

Ontario Healthy Schools Coalition

In September 2005, Barbara Ronson stepped down as Co-Chair of the Ontario Healthy Schools Coalition to take up a post at Assistant Professor in the Department of Education at Acadia University in Wolfville, Nova Scotia. While she will be missed, we wish Barbara all the very best in her new position at Acadia. Fran Perkins from the Centre’s International Health Promotion Unit, is stepping into the role of Co-Chair. Welcome, Fran.

In June 2005, the Coalition hosted its 4th annual Forum / Strategic Planning Day, which provided us with an opportunity to once again to celebrate successes, raise awareness, and plan for the future.

Resulting from the Forum was a paper entitled Achieving the Vision of Healthy Schools Across Ontario: Priority Areas for Action. The paper, which was prepared for the Ministries of Health and Long Term Care, Education, Child and Youth Services and Recreation and Tourism, identified four priority areas of action needed in order to widely disseminate “healthy schools’ across the province: provincial policy and coordination; funding and personnel; awareness-raising and consultation, and; assessment tools and evaluation.

In addition to the Forum, the Ontario Healthy Schools Coalition continues to hold its bi-monthly meetings, which are well attended by professionals and lay people both in person at OISE/UT and by teleconference.

For more information contact Carol MacDougall at cmacdoug@toronto.ca or Fran Perkins at fran.perkins@sympatico.ca.

-- Fran Perkins and Carol MacDougall

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Update on Centre's Special Projects

Literacy and Health Research Project

Since the last e-mail letter, a revised version of the paper on Literacy and Health Research that Barbara Ronson and I prepared for the CIHR International Think Tank on Reducing Health Disparities in September 2003, was published in a Supplement to the Canadian Journal of Public Health (Volume 6, Supplement 2, March/April, 2005). The full text can be accessed on the National Literacy and Health Research Program website at http://www.nlhp.cpha.ca/lithlthe/cover.htm.

We also organized a very successful National Summer Institute on Literacy and Health Research in Vancouver from July 25-28. Overall, approximately 40 researchers, graduate students, practitioners and funders attended this four day event which included a one-day provincial workshop. A report and presentations from the Institute can be found at http://www.nlhp.cpha.ca/clhrp/index_e.htm, the National Literacy and Health website and a report and presentations from the provincial workshop can be found on the website of the Centre for Community Health Promotion Research at the University of Victoria (www.hp.uvic.ca).

Finally, the Centre for Health Promotion took the lead in the preparing a proposal to develop capacity for literacy and health research in Canada which is currently being considered for funding by the National Literacy Secretariat. If funded, the Centre will take a lead role in this project.

-- Irving Rootman

Urban Health Promotion Research Working Group

A Working Group, chaired by Shelley Young, Policy Research Advisor, Public Health Agency of Canada, was formed in 2004 with the mandate to set a research agenda for the Centre for Health Promotion and develop research proposals that the Centre could submit for funding.

Since its inception, the group has considered several broad areas of focus, including the health of aging immigrants and the impact of “unhealthy” public policy on urban health. These topics will be considered at a later date.

The first topic selected for research proposal development will be youth related literacy and health issues. The topic is timely and relevant, as it builds on current healthy schools and literacy and health work. Developing projects with a specific focus on school literacy interventions and their evaluation are being explored. Such interventions may include working with youth within the school environment and the broader school community. The proposed topic could complement work being done and researched in British Columbia.

Several researchers working with these and related issues have recently joined the working group. These include Irv Rootman, Andy Anderson, Cam Norman and Judy King. Also joining the group is Blair Johnston, a nursing student working with Suzanne Jackson this Fall. Blair will continue the literature search started by Elio Moreno, a health promotion student working with Ted Mavor. Blair and Suzanne will also work on definitions and components presently available for a proposal. Additional members of the group include: Peri Ballantyne, Rick Edwards, Suzanne Jackson, Heidi McGuire, Raza Mirza, Elsie Petch, Barbara Ronson and Colleen Stanton.

For additional information please contact Shelley Young at Shelley_ Young@phac-aspc.gc.

-- Elsie Petch

Housing and Health

For the second year in a row, we were not successful in our application for funding for the research with those waiting for public housing in Toronto. This fall, we are applying to the CIHR Vulnerable Populations and Reducing Disparities fund. This is a research project entitled “Reducing Vulnerabilities in People Waiting for Public Housing in Toronto” in partnership with the Toronto Community Housing Corporation and with a multidisciplinary team of researchers from public health sciences, sociology and political science. Many thanks to Rosie Mishaiel, who has been assisting with this application in September and October.

Other Projects

Suzanne, with the support of a nursing practicum student, Blair Johnston and in partnership with Helene Valentini in Quebec, has been asked to write a chapter on the impact of Canadian health promotion activities internationally for a new version of Michel O’Neill, Ann Pederson and Irv Rootman’s book Health Promotion in Canada. The book will be released in French at a special Health Promotion conference to be held on October 25, 2006 in the context of the 10th anniversary of les Journées annuelles de santé publique, the main public heath event in Quebec which usually brings together between 1000 and 1500 participants. It will be released in English at the IUHPE Conference in Vancouver in June 2007.

MHSc Student Practicums in Health Promotion

From May 2005 to the present, two University of Toronto practicum students joined us at the Centre.

Rosie Mishaiel, an MHSc student from the Health Promotion program, started at the Centre in May 2005. For her practicum, she edited a manual that was jointly developed by the Centre for Health Promotion and Pan American Health Organization and was designed to educate lay people in communities in Canada and Trinidad on how to conduct a participatory evaluation of a local health promotion initiative. Rosie also assisted with the Health Promotion Summer School 2005, facilitating toolbox sessions and analyzing pre-school evaluations. Following the end of her practicum, Rosie stayed on at the Centre and is currently working on a research proposal for CIHR entitled “Reducing Vulnerability in Those Waiting for Social Housing”.

Blair Johnston joined us at the Centre in September 2005. Blair is a student in her final year in Nursing at U of T and will stay with us until December. She is assisting Suzanne in writing a chapter for the 2nd edition of the book Health Promotion in Canada, is working on reviving the Healthy U of T Group with Jody MacDonald of Nursing, and will sit on the Healthy U of T Awards’ selection committee. She is also completing a literature search for the Urban Health Promotion Working Group.

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Centre E-info Update
Centre for Health Promotion
University of Toronto
100 College Street, Suite 207
Toronto, ON M5G 1L5
http://www.utoronto.ca/chp


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