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.
Note: This practice has been Archived.
Filed under Good Idea, Community / Social Environment, Families
Goal: The goal of this program is to change the child protection field by demonstrating a new approach to safeguarding children and supporting families. Based on the premise that many people, agencies, and organizations in a community can contribute to children's safety, the initiative addresses child abuse and neglect by raising neighborhood awareness of child safety issues, empowering neighborhood residents to become more involved with families at risk of abusing or neglecting their children, strengthening locally based organizations and helping them form networks concerned with child safety, and fostering policy, practice, and organizational changes within public sector child protective services agencies. This approach is known as community child protection.
Note: This practice has been Archived.
Filed under Effective Practice, Health / Heart Disease & Stroke, Older Adults
Goal: The goal of this program is to improve patient's knowledge about heart failure.
Note: This practice has been Archived.
Filed under Good Idea, Health / Children's Health, Children
Goal: The goal of this program is to improve asthma management among urban children up to 18 years of age.
Note: This practice has been Archived.
Filed under Effective Practice, Economy / Poverty, Racial/Ethnic Minorities
Goal: A core objective of the career ladder model is to ensure that low-income participants progress beyond the paraprofessional level. The goal is to aid welfare recipients to move from welfare to the paraprofessional level, then on to a career.
Note: This practice has been Archived.
Filed under Effective Practice, Education / Educational Attainment
Goal: The goal of this program was to teach staff the skills necessary to encourage an optimum learning environment for disabled students.
Enrolling and Supporting Organizations Who Encourage Donation of Organs, Marrow, Tissue, or Blood (Buncombe County, NC)
Note: This practice has been Archived.
Filed under Effective Practice, Community / Civic Engagement
Goal: In May, 2002, the Buncombe County Medical Society committed to enrolling 100 organizations into the Workplace Partnership initiative. BCMS declared itself "community headquarters" for recruiting Buncombe County businesses and organizations in the Workplace Partnership for Life program, and implemented a plan to support these organizations in their efforts to urge donation.
Note: This practice has been Archived.
Filed under Good Idea, Health / Alcohol & Drug Use, Families, Urban
Goal: The goal of this program is to prevent parents who are addicted to drugs from relapsing, and to prevent substance abuse among their children.
Impact: Although studies evaluating the effectiveness of this program on the behaviors of drug-using parents and their children showed some positive findings, the overall evidence suggested no effects.
Note: This practice has been Archived.
Filed under Effective Practice, Environmental Health / Energy & Sustainability
Goal: The goal of this program was to conserve energy in Azusa, California.
Note: This practice has been Archived.
Filed under Good Idea, Community / Social Environment, Families
Goal: The goal of this program is to provide comprehensive statewide strategies for Florida to promote violence-free, substance-abuse-free, respectful, nurturing families based on the foundation of a healthy marriage relationship between parents.
Note: This practice has been Archived.
Filed under Effective Practice, Health / Diabetes, Adults, Racial/Ethnic Minorities, Urban
Goal: The goal of Focus on Diabetes was to improve the health and health-related quality of life of African Americans with diabetes through community-based self-care education and events.