A Common Agenda for Public Health Workforce Development

 

In 2020, the de Beaumont Foundation convened a Planning Committee representing public health agencies and associations, academia, philanthropy, and the federal government to relaunch the National Consortium for Public Health Workforce Development and to develop an action plan for strengthening and supporting the public health workforce. The COVID-19 pandemic had laid bare and exacerbated gaps in the workforce, and persistent health disparities highlighted the need to ensure the workforce could support communities. 

It was clear to the Planning Committee that the public health workforce will not be able to ensure the well-being of everyone in this country until the public health community collaborates to overcome the underlying issues and conditions that limit the effectiveness of the workforce and impede the equitable delivery of public health services. 

To provide a concrete starting place, the National Consortium will focus on state, Tribal, local, and territorial public health (also referred to as governmental public health). Nevertheless, we hope the work we do will ultimately benefit the entire workforce.

Over the next few months, the Steering Committee of the National Consortium will share the outcomes of its collaborative work: decisions about where we need to focus, what we need to do to succeed, and what we must keep in mind as we pursue our collective vision. 

While the Steering Committee has led this effort, the outcomes reflect the input of hundreds of members of the public health community across the country, for which we are grateful and which we hope will persist as we begin to do the hard work of collaborating to achieve our vision.

Steering Committee Members

The Steering Committee of the National Consortium for Public Health Workforce Development is a diverse group of committed people representing state, city, and rural public health leaders; universities and training providers; philanthropy; federal agencies; and (most importantly) the public health workforce. They have collaborated since October 2020 to develop the draft common agenda that, with your input, will guide the work of the Consortium moving forward.

  • Kaye Bender, American Public Health Association (Co-Chair)
  • Lauren Powell, Takeda (Co-Chair)
  • Amber Williams, Association of State and Territorial Health Officials
  • Andre Fresco, Yakima Health District (WA)
  • Ashley Edmiston, National Association of County and City Health Officials
  • Betty Bekemeier, University of Washington School of Public Health
  • Cynthia Harris, Florida Agricultural and Mechanical University
  • Denise Smith, National Association of Community Health Workers
  • Donna Petersen, University of South Florida
  • Georgia Heise, Three Rivers District Health Department (KY)
  • Lauren Ramos, Health Resources and Services Administration
  • Liljana Baddour, Louisiana Department of Health
  • Michael Meit, East Tennessee State University Center for Rural Health Research
  • Mighty Fine, American Public Health Association
  • Monica Valdes Lupi, Kresge Foundation
  • Patricia Simone, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
  • Paul Kuehnert, Public Health Accreditation Board
  • Rita Kelliher, Association of Schools and Programs of Public Health
  • Ron Bialek, Public Health Foundation
  • Steve Reynolds, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
  • Vincent LaFronza, National Network of Public Health Institutes
  • Wilma Wooten, County of San Diego Health and Human Services Agency (CA)

Founders Committee Members

The Founders Committee came together to create a vision for the collective movement to change the public health workforce. They were responsible for imagining and defining what a successful collaborative change effort would look like, adjusting this original vision to account for the global COVID-19 pandemic, selecting a systems change expert to lead the work through a request for proposal process, and providing guidance to the selected applicant, FSG, about how to build the foundation of this collective impact process.

  • Ashley Edmiston, National Association of County and City Health Officials
  • Dorothy Cilenti, UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health
  • Gaby Benenson, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
  • Gen Meredith, Cornell University Public Health
  • Heather Krasna, Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health
  • Jennifer McKeever, WE Public Health
  • Jessica Solomon Fisher, Public Health Accreditation Board
  • Jovonni Spinner, Food and Drug Administration
  • Kathleen Amos, Public Health Foundation
  • Kaye Bender, American Public Health Association
  • Kyle Bogaert, Association of State and Territorial Health Officials
  • Liljana Baddour, Louisiana Department of Health
  • Monica Valdes Lupi, Kresge Foundation
  • Rita Kelliher, Association of Schools and Programs of Public Health
  • Rivka Liss-Levinson, Center for State and Local Government Excellence and ICMA Retirement Corporation
  • Shirley Orr, SOCO Consulting and Association of Public Health Nurses
  • Steve Reynolds, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention