Community Engagement Core

点击翻译按钮获取中文摘要

The Community Engagement Core (CEC) is pivotal to the scientific and public health impact of the Southern California Center for Chronic Health Disparities in Latino Families and Children. The CEC will establish and maintain collaborations between researchers, community organizations, clinicians and healthcare systems, public health agencies, policy makers, and other key stakeholders. The CEC will be co-directed by Drs. Kipke (CHLA) and Baezconde-Garbanati (USC) who both have extensive experience leading large-scale consortia, conducting, and evaluating health promotion interventions with underrepresented communities, and leading community engagement cores, and have an established track-record working together in this work. The Core will leverage and build upon an existing network of NCAT funded Community Engagement Programs in Southern California, which includes USC, University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), University of California, Irvine (UCI), and Scripps Research Translational Institute (Scripps). Other partners include University of California, Riverside (UCR); Kaiser Permanente of Southern California; Family Health Centers of San Diego; Public Health Foundation Enterprises Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children; and the Public Health Alliance of Southern California (a consortium of all 10 County Health Departments). Representatives from each partner institution will form the Community Engagement Leadership Team which will work in concert to support the Center’s mission through a range of services, including: 1) Community engagement consultations to support and assist Center projects and pilots with recruitment, retention, forging community partners, and disseminating study findings; 2) Community listening sessions to identify community needs and priorities for future studies; 3) Training promotores de salud to offer education and advocacy related to Latino health; 4) Our Community/Our Health townhalls and other educational workshops that promote sharing of information and research findings; 5) Research 101, a workshop designed to build capacity of community members to play a meaningful role in academic-community partnerships; 6) A Community Reviewer Training Program designed to prepare community members to participate as peer reviewers in the Center’s pilot study program; 7) Community Mentoring Program, which pairs trainees and early career faculty from the Investigator Development Core with community mentors; 8) Citizen Scientists designed to inform and empower community members to become advocates for chronic disease prevention, and increase the workforce for community research and dissemination of Center’s research for informed policy making; and 9) Developing novel approaches to disseminating findings to key stakeholders, especially lay audiences. Through these actions and close integration with other Center Cores, projects and pilot studies, the CEC will play a critical role in strengthening community partnership in all Center activities, with the aim of maximizing the impact of Center findings in Latino communities of Southern California to reduce disparities in multiple chronic diseases.