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Promising Practices

The Promising Practices database informs professionals and community members about documented approaches to improving community health and quality of life.

The ultimate goal is to support the systematic adoption, implementation, and evaluation of successful programs, practices, and policy changes. The database provides carefully reviewed, documented, and ranked practices that range from good ideas to evidence-based practices.
Learn more about the ranking methodology.

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Coalition for Community Schools (USA)

Filed under Effective Practice, Education / Student Performance K-12, Children, Teens, Families

Goal: Coalition for Community Schools’ mission is to mobilize the resources and capacity of multiple sectors and institutions to create a united movement for community schools.

College Track (Oakland, CA)

Filed under Effective Practice, Education / Educational Attainment, Teens

Goal: College Track's goal is to transform low-income communities into places where college readiness and college graduation are the norms by providing direct service, community partnerships, and advocacy.

Colon Cancer Risk Counseling (Hawaii)

Filed under Effective Practice, Health / Cancer, Families

Goal: The goal of this program is to increase cancer screening among individuals with first-degree relatives who have had colorectal cancer.

Colorado on the Move (Colorado)

Filed under Good Idea, Health / Physical Activity, Racial/Ethnic Minorities

Goal: The goal of this program is to increase participants' physical activity.

Commit 2B Fit (Florida)

Filed under Effective Practice, Health / Children's Health, Children, Families

Goal: The goal of Commit 2B Fit is to educate and motivate children to be physically active and develop healthy eating habits.

Communicable Disease Prevention/Public Health Preparedness: HealthSentry (Kansas City, MO)

Filed under Effective Practice, Health / Immunizations & Infectious Diseases

Goal: The goal of HealthSentry is to meet the challenge of linking public health organizations to reliable clinical data without burdensome manual data collection and reporting.more timely and accurate reporting.

Communities Supporting Breastfeeding (Kansas)

Filed under Effective Practice, Health / Maternal, Fetal & Infant Health, Families

Goal: The purpose of the Community Supporting Breastfeeding (CSB) designation program is to create a culture of breastfeeding support in communities, ultimately increasing breastfeeding initiation and duration rates and the health and well-being of families.

The CSB program’s immediate goals are to increase positive perceptions toward breastfeeding, increase the availability of breastfeeding resources, and reduce barriers experienced in the community by women of child-bearing age. The long-term goal of the project is to increase exclusive breastfeeding rates through a sustainable model of cross-sector support for breastfeeding.

The project also effectively addresses the racial and socioeconomic disparities in breastfeeding rates. The Kansas Breastfeeding Coalition’s collective impact approach supports efforts of those serving African-American and lower income women. As a result of this project, these organizations receive the support they need to increase their impact when they become aligned with other, larger organizations working toward similar goals, creating a synergy across groups working on breastfeeding support.

Impact: Based on results from our evaluation, along with improved exclusive breastfeeding rates in the majority of the communities that could be associated with the CSB criteria, we believe the CSB program is impactful.

Communities That Care Coalition (Franklin County, MA)

Filed under Effective Practice, Health / Adolescent Health, Teens

Goal: The Communities That Care Coalition's mission is to bring Franklin County schools, parents, youth and the community together to promote protective factors, reduce risk factors, prevent substance use and other risky behaviors, and improve young people's ability to reach their full potential and thrive.

Community Action Model (San Francisco, CA)

Filed under Effective Practice, Health / Alcohol & Drug Use, Racial/Ethnic Minorities

Goal: The original goal of the Community Action Model has been to improve the health and environment of a community by reducing tobacco influences while building community capacity. It can be applied to a variety of health and welfare issues and has been used successfully in many communities with multiple topics of intervention.

Impact: The Community Action Model has resulted in new tobacco control policies within San Francisco, many of which serve as models for other communities.

An Effective Practice meets the following HCI criteria:

  1. The program description includes at a minimum: the sponsoring organization, program goals, program implementation steps, and outcomes that have demonstrated program success and/or promise in achieving the program goal in one or more localities.
  2. The results from an evaluation of the program include quantitative measures of improvement in outcome of interest (i.e. increase in voter registration, not just delivery of voter registration drive) and/ or the outcome measure is increased or improved compared to the baseline measurement or the control group but the difference is not statistically significant.

A Good Idea meets the following HCI criteria:

  1. The program description includes: the sponsoring organization, program goals, program funding source, program implementation steps and outcomes.
  2. The program evaluation is limited to descriptive measure(s) of success/accomplishment (i.e., program participation rates, number of services/education sessions/radio messages provided). Note: oftentimes, the program has been newly implemented and a program evaluation has not yet been conducted. Programs that have not yet been evaluated, but which show promise in improving health or quality of life, are classified as Good Ideas until an evaluation is conducted.

An Evidence-Based Practice meets the following HCI criteria:

  1. The program description includes at a minimum: the sponsoring organization, program goals, program implementation steps, and outcomes that have demonstrated program success in achieving the program goal in one or more localities.
  2. The results from an evaluation of the program include quantitative measures showing improvement in the outcome(s) of interest after the implementation of the program (i.e. increase in smoking cessation, not just the delivery of a smoking cessation program). The outcome measure(s) is/are compared at relevant time periods before and after the intervention or program implementation. Alternatively, the evaluation study compares the outcome(s) between an intervention group and an appropriate control group.
  3. The study is of peer-review quality and presents numbers in a scientific manner; measurements of precision and reliability are included (e.g. confidence intervals, standard errors), results from statistical tests show a significant difference or change in the outcome measure(s), and relevant point estimates and p-values are presented. Note: if the results from an evaluation of a program are presented in a scientific manner and the outcome measure is improved compared to the baseline measurement or the control group but the difference is not statistically significant, the practice is classified as effective and not evidence-based.