1. Building Workforce Bridges Across Six Northwest States Susan Yee Northwest Center for Public Health Practice University of Washington January 14, 2002

2. Overview Purpose Findings Recommendations Next Steps

3. Pausing for a Moment... Role of HRSA Role of NWCPHP

4. Why a Regional Analysis? Describe assets & common training needs of people working in public health practice to encourage resource sharing. Identify what distance learning, i.e., technology & infrastructure is needed to support life-long learning for public health practitioners.

5. Findings Five categories for analysis: –Knowledge deficits/unmet needs –Barriers –Strengths & resources –Preferred mode of receiving training –Preferred length of training

6. What are the Unmet Needs? Communications Administrative skills/management/supervision Overview of “public health 101” Computer training/use & technology

7. What are the Barriers? Lack of $$$ Geographic isolation Limited staff Lack of time Politics

8. There is Good News!! Strengths & Existing Resources –Technology Community networks & access to satellite downlink facilities –Existing training opportunities & conferences programmatic training opportunities & certification courses –Infrastructural & philosophical support tied workforce development w/ overall public health improvement efforts

9. So what? Recommendation #1 Identify & use existing training opportunities available within the NW region to maximize collaboration and to reduce duplicate efforts.

10. Recommendation #2 Offer & support distance learning as an alternative to on-site training, when appropriate.

11. Recommendation #3 Find opportunities to integrate workforce development issues with other public health improvement issues.

12. Recommendation #4 Use the NWCPHP to act as a liaison to link Northwest regional workforce efforts with other regional efforts for purposes of sharing products & strategies on a national level.

13. Recommendation #5 Utilize information & results from this report to solicit additional funding while maximizing current funding from CDC and federal bioterrorism grants.

14. Recommendation #6 Solicit specific information from individual states about the content & intent of requested training and determine how the training will link to improved performance before developing curriculum.

15. And Finally Recommendation #7 Explore other areas of workforce development other than “training” in order to include “learning,” “mentoring,” and “succession planning.”

16. Some other thoughts... Use training as an incentive for purposes of retention & recruitment. Offer training to students in the workforce “pipeline.”

17. So what NOW?!?!