Promising Practices

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Economy / Government Assistance, Families

Goal: The goal of the Minnesota Family Investment Program (MFIP) is to help families transition to economic stability by providing financial incentives to work.

Impact: Although MFIP cost Minnesota more than the ADFC welfare program, MFIP overall increased employment and wage earnings of participants by supplementing low income with welfare supplements. Most encouragingly, there is evidence to suggest the effects of the program persist after the program ended for the most disadvantaged.

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Older Adults, Adults, Women, Men, Older Adults

Goal: SHHC targets individual, social, and built environment levels of behavior change and is designed to improve diet and physical activity behaviors, assess and improve local food and physical environment resources, and shift social norms about active living and healthy eating through civic engagement and capacity building.

Filed under Good Idea, Environmental Health / Toxins & Contaminants, Rural

Goal: The goal of this study was to address the health effects of PFOA pollution, with a strong desire to implement a community-driven communication strategy to communicate the study results.

Filed under Effective Practice, Community / Domestic Violence & Abuse, Families

Goal: The mission of DAIP is to provide advocacy on behalf of battered women. DAIP staff provide information and assess the women's safety regardless of the situation, but they also offer advocacy at three key time periods: immediately after police intervention and arrest, throughout the court proceedings, and after case disposition. The advocates offer support and information about available community resources, explain the criminal court process, describe the civil court remedies available, and obtain information from the women in order to serve as their liaisons to the legal system and to ascertain the level of danger that each woman is in.

Filed under Effective Practice, Health / Wellness & Lifestyle

Goal: To increase quality of life and longevity among members of a community through community-wide interventions which address community, social network, habitat, and inner self.

Filed under Effective Practice, Health / Physical Activity, Teens, Racial/Ethnic Minorities, Urban

Goal: To improve participation of African Americans in health promotion and intervention research.

Filed under Good Idea, Environmental Health / Air, Children, Teens

Goal: PGF is working to complete the retrofit of all 4,000 eligible school buses in the state. PGF also aims to reduce Minnesota's ambient air pollution, and help Minnesota avoid being declared a non-attainment area under the federal Clean Air Act.

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Alcohol & Drug Use, Teens

Goal: The program’s goal is to delay the age when young people begin drinking and to reduce drinking among those who have already started.

Impact: Studies have shown that by the end of the intervention, participating students were significantly less likely to drink alcohol than nonparticipants. Also, students who did not use alcohol before participating in the program were less likely to use alcohol after the intervention than similar youth who did not participate.

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Alcohol & Drug Use, Teens

Goal: A.S.P.I.R.E aims to reduce teen tobacco use by helping current smokers to quit and preventing non-smokers from beginning to smoke.

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

Goal: The goal of Coordinated Approach to Child Health (CATCH) is to improve nutrition, increase physical activity, and reduce obesity in preschool, elementary, and middle school aged children.

Impact: CATCH is successful in improving participants' diet and physical activity, and the results lasted three years after participation.