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.
Filed under Effective Practice, Education / Student Performance K-12, Children, Teens, Adults
Goal: The goal of the program is to make a positive difference in the lives of children, primarily through professionally guided one-to-one relationships with caring adults, and to assist them in achieving their highest potential, as they grow to become confident, competent and caring individuals.
Filed under Good Idea, Health / Maternal, Fetal & Infant Health, Racial/Ethnic Minorities, Urban
Goal: Community Voice is a grassroots program that utilizes community residents to provide factual perinatal information throughout the community in an effort to reduce African American infant mortality.
Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Mental Health & Mental Disorders, Children, Families
Goal: The goal of this program is to reduce aggressive behavior and delinquency in children by applying the contextual sociocognitive model.
Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Health Care Access & Quality, Adults, Women, Racial/Ethnic Minorities
Goal: The goal of Cultivando la Salud is to increase breast and cervical cancer screening among low-income Hispanic women.
Filed under Effective Practice, Health / Diabetes, Racial/Ethnic Minorities
Goal: The goal of this promising practice was to provide Mexican-Americans with the knowledge, skills, and support to improve general health measures and manage their diabetes.
Filed under Good Idea, Education / Childcare & Early Childhood Education, Children, Families
Goal: ECEAP is a community-based, family-focused, comprehensive, pre-kindergarten program designed to help children and their families who are in poverty. The program focuses on helping three- and four-year-olds prepare for and succeed in school while helping their parents progress toward self-sufficiency.
Filed under Effective Practice, Health / Alcohol & Drug Use, Teens, Families
Goal: EFFEKT seeks to reduce teenage alcohol use by changing the attitudes of their parents. Information is disseminated to the parents at school meetings at the beginning of each semester and through regular communications.
Impact: EFFEKT seeks to reduce teen drinking by changing parental behaviors through structured presentations at their child’s school. Working with parents proved to be an effective way to reduce underage drinking as well as teen delinquency.
Filed under Effective Practice, Environmental Health / Toxins & Contaminants, Children, Teens, Adults
Goal: To restore the Elizabeth River to the highest practical level of environmental quality through government, business and community partnerships.
Filed under Good Idea, Health / Health Care Access & Quality, Children, Adults, Families, Urban
Goal: The goals of Engage DuPage include improving the health status of self-pay Emergency Department patients, increasing the revenue appropriately owed to hospitals for services rendered, improving the financial assistance processes involving self-pay Emergency Department patients, and reducing the number of avoidable Emergency Department visits among self-pay patients.
Impact: By the end of 2014, 57% of all benefit applications that were submitted were approved. In addition, 29% of all interested patients were connected to a primary care provider through a Community Access Specialist.
Filed under Effective Practice, Education / Literacy, Children, Adults, Families
Goal: The Even Start Literacy Program is an education program for economically challenged families that is designed to improve the academic achievement of young children and their parents, especially in the areas of reading and language.