Professional Development
Customized Training and Practice-Related Courses
The Center for Public Health Practice (CPHP) is a member of the Pacific Public Health Training Center (PPHTC), which also includes schools of public health at UCLA, Loma Linda, San Diego State, and the University of Hawaii School of Nursing. The PPHTC is funded by a grant from the Health Services Resources Administration and is part of the National Public Health Training Center Network. The mission of the PPHTC is to develop and maintain a skilled public health workforce in California, Hawaii, and the U.S. Associated Pacific Islands in order to support and enhance individual and community health.
PPHTC works with an advisory board and community partners to identify priority training needs to increase the practice capacity and capability of the California and local public health workforce. A priority focus is on assisting staff develop and demonstrate greater performance aligned with the Public Health Competencies established by the Council on Linkages. PPHTC offers more than a dozen public health 101 training modules, in English and Spanish, through its web site (PPHTC.org). In addition, each partner school has statewide and local activities.
UC Berkeley School of Public Health's PPHTC activities have focused on four priority areas:
- Providing or funding management training needs identified by our health department partners at the Alameda, Contra Costa, and City of Berkeley Health Departments. Trainings have included negotiation, project management, leadership, human resources, strategic planning, and cultural and linguistic competency.
- Practice-focused conferences in partnership with community partners to strengthen their capacity, knowledge, competency, and incorporation of best practices regarding strategies and interventions to reduce health inequities and improve cultural and linguistic competency.
- Workshops for students and practitioners to strengthen competencies such as grant writing, needs assessment, financial management, time management, program planning, communication, and leadership.
- Training modules for the PPHTC web site and in-person sessions for practitioners who are outside of Northern California but part of the PPHTC such as trainings in Inyo/Mono Counties, San Diego, and Hawaii. These activities have primarily focused on cultural and linguistic competency and management competencies.
In 2005-2006, CPHP provided more than 25 training sessions to public health professionals and offered three major conferences in conjunction with community and academic partners. Conferences included "Poverty, Race, and Place: Community-based and Research Strategies to Reduce Health Inequities", "Evaluating Community Capacity Building Efforts Aimed at Reducing Health Inequities" and "Privilege, Bias, and Oppression: Addressing Barriers to Eliminating Health Disparities Within Health Organizations."
Through the PPHTC and UC Berkeley practice related courses, the Center for Public Health Practice offers custom trainings for students and practitioners. Many trainings are held on the Berkeley campus while others are provided on site at local health departments and health organizations. Examples of trainings and practice courses provided in the past year include:
Scientific Grants for the CDC and NIH
Discover how to manage timing issues and learn proposal strategies for different funding agencies with a particular focus on CDC and NIH funding. Examine different types of grants available for biomedical researchers, the review process, and scoring criteria. Learn how to integrate your scientific ideas into a fundable grant.
Discover Your Management Style
The role of the manager has evolved as organizations struggle with increased expectations and decreased resources. Responsibility for results is being placed on all members of the team. This workshop is geared towards people who may assume a supervisory or lead role in an organization or research office. Learn some of the traits and skills needed to assume these roles, both formally and informally, in multiple public health settings. Identify strategies for successfully interacting with those whose style is different from your own.
Project Management
Public health organizations and agencies are becoming more streamlined in their operations in order to effectively use declining resources. Today, public health professionals are asked to perform multiple tasks, to work cross-functionally, and to participate on project teams without direct managers. Oftentimes, these teams are led by persons who have expertise in certain areas or tasks, but may not possess management experience. This workshop is designed for public health professionals and students who find themselves managing projects. Participants will learn how to define the project, initiate planning, control project events, and how toto bring the project to a successful conclusion using scheduling. This workshop will provide step-by-step tools that participants can implement immediately.
The Whole Brain Model: Understanding Working Styles
Participants will learn about this four-quadrant metaphoric model and other preferred modes of thinking, learning, and working. Using this highly validated model, participants own preferences will emerge. At the end of this workshop, participants will be able to identify and overcome communication roadblocks. Participants will also be able to resolve cross-cultural communication issues.
Introduction to Finance
This session will provide the essential vocabulary of accounting and finance as well as orient participants to the fundamental tools used to convey financial information. Become familiar with the technical rather than the colloquial use of business terminology. Learn the construction and function of key financial statements including the balance sheet, income statement, and statement of cash flows.
Finance II: Financial Statements
Building on the first session, learn how to take financial statements from a health care organization and do a complete financial analysis. These analytical techniques are essential to discern the true financial picture of a health care organization. This examination is useful for a variety of purposes, including competitor analysis and examination of the financial position of a company before finalizing a decision to take a job with that company.
Finance III: Organizational budgets
Building on concepts learned in the introductory session, this session provides a step-by-step approach to budgeting in health care organizations. Adding important concepts from managerial accounting for non-financial managers, this will help you understand the organization-wide budget process so that you can increase the likelihood of proper funding in your own department or programs. A pro forma budget will be developed as a skill building exercise in this session.
Basic Presentation Skills
This workshop addresses reducing speaking anxiety, review and practice of basic outline creation, creation/effective use of visual aids/PowerPoint presentations, and improving presentation delivery. Participants will learn to understand and work with different communication styles. In addition, participants will be able to create and deliver stronger presentations.
Negotiation Principles and Tactics
Public health professionals in all disciplines encounter situations where they must negotiate. Researchers may have to negotiate during the IRB process. Program managers may have to negotiate grant agreements with state and local government agencies. Health care executives are often called upon to negotiate physician agreements and other employee contracts with health personnel. Negotiation is designed to improve both the participants' understanding of negotiation and their effectiveness as negotiators. Participants will learn useful principles and tactics that are part of most, if not all, negotiations.
Moderating Focus Groups
Participants will learn 10 practical strategies to create and maintain focus group discussions during this 2-hour skills-based workshop. In addition, participants will improve skills in a short time using practical exercises and examples. This is ideal for students, faculty, staff, and community evaluators. Workshop participants will learn to build rapport, create energy, and maximize time for discussion; learn to be neutral and yet build respect for all opinions; apply communication tools to both generate and subdue responses; either evaluate a moderator, act as a moderator, or role play a respondent in a mock focus group; and become confident about using strategies in focus groups, community forums, committee meetings, and social settings.
Needs Assessment I& II
This two-part course, designed for non-statisticians, enables participants to learn: why needs assessments of public health programs and building commitment for it are important; and how to design and conduct practical and effective public health program needs assessments.
Writing Tricks of the Trade
In this workshop, participants will improve writing skills for biomedical journal articles and grants, and improve skills in a short time using practical examples and exercises. This is ideal for graduate students, postdoctoral fellows, and assistant professors. Participants will learn six practical techniques to improve clarity and conciseness across all sections of journal manuscripts and grants; learn why and how to use these techniques, and improve skills during the workshop with short writing exercises.
Health Policy and Advocacy: Nuts and Bolts
How is public health policy made? Who decides what becomes policy? How can you advocate before legislative bodies for public health issues? Advocacy may be simply defined as arguing for a cause, often on behalf of others. It also involves the building of relationships between government officials and those they serve. In most cases, the goal of advocacy is to advance a certain viewpoint, group of people, or cause by changing or enforcing public policy. Once laws are adopted, administrative agencies such as the California Department of Health Services have responsibility for implementing policy by adapting rules or regulations. This workshop will cover the legislative process and provide insight into what "goes on behind the scenes" that ultimately impacts public health. Learn key rules and procedures to use in planning and preparing for advocacy in the legislative arena. Take away specific strategies to use when dealing with legislative bodies. Learn about procedures and nuances of administrative agencies that will help you advocate on behalf of public health issues.