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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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The Isles Career Center (Trenton, NJ)

Note: This practice has been Archived.

Filed under Effective Practice, Economy / Employment, Teens, Urban

Goal: Isles, Inc., is a nationally recognized nonprofit community development and environmental organization with the mission to foster more self-reliant families in healthy, sustainable communities.

The Millennium Project

Note: This practice has been Archived.

Filed under Good Idea, Community / Governance

Goal: The Project's central objective is to provide information to decision makers and training materials to add focus to important issues, clarify choices and improve the quality of decisions by making future opportunities and dangers more explicit. The Project is not a one-time study of the future, but provides an on-going capacity for global research and collaboration.

The Pawtucket Heart Health Program (Pawtucket, RI)

Note: This practice has been Archived.

Filed under Effective Practice, Health / Heart Disease & Stroke, Urban

Goal: The goal of this program was to reduce risk factors which impact cardiovascular morbidity and mortality.

The Virginia Cardiovascular Health Program (Virginia)

Note: This practice has been Archived.

Filed under Good Idea, Health / Heart Disease & Stroke

Goal: The goal of this program is to improve blood pressure monitoring and treatment.

VERB Summer Scorecard (Kentucky)

Note: This practice has been Archived.

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Physical Activity, Children, Teens

Goal: To increase and maintain physical activity among tweens (youth ages 9-13).

Worksite Wellness Programs for North Carolina Government Employees (North Carolina)

Note: This practice has been Archived.

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Physical Activity

Goal: To reduce employee risk of developing chronic health conditions and to contain rising health care costs by establishing worksite wellness programs throughout state government.

Youth AIDS Prevention Project (Chicago)

Note: This practice has been Archived.

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Adolescent Health, Teens, Racial/Ethnic Minorities, Urban

Goal: The goal of YAPP was to increase awareness of risky sexual behaviors and to reduce the risk of HIV and STD infection associated with such behaviors.

ACCESS to Healthcare Information for Culturally Diverse Populations Project (Oneida County, NY)

Note: This practice has been Archived.

Filed under Effective Practice, Health / Health Care Access & Quality, Racial/Ethnic Minorities

Goal: The goal of the ACCESS to Healthcare Information for Culturally Diverse Populations Project is to reduce health disparities for culturally and linguistically diverse populations within the community.

Art Not Crime (Portland, Oregon)

Note: This practice has been Archived.

Filed under Good Idea, Community / Social Environment, Children, Teens, Adults, Urban

Goal: Art Not Crime promotes social sustainability by providing a safe place for individuals to create urban inspired pieces of art and display them where their art is appreciated as the language of this new culture and not classified as crime.

Bethlehem Police Family Group Conferencing Project (Bethlehem, PA)

Note: This practice has been Archived.

Filed under Effective Practice, Community / Crime & Crime Prevention, Children, Teens

Goal: The goal of this program is to divert young first-time offenders from court and into conferences where they can negotiate solutions with their families and their victims.

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.