Suchergebnisse

When Congress passed the Affordable Care Act in 2010, it required all non-profit hospitals in the United States to routinely conduct a community health needs assessment. The purpose of a community health needs assessment is to first identify the community health needs and then create an implementation strategy to address the identified needs. Little guidance has been provided by the federal requirement on how to conduct this community research. Through conducting more than 25 community health needs assessments, I describe the mistakes encountered as an outsider trying to gather primary data at the community level, including administrative resistance and lack of participation. Specifically, the need to arrange for key informant interviews and focus groups, and distribute a survey, was hampered by lack of knowledge of the community and its events. This essay describes the strengths and weaknesses of working with administrators. The ability to outline the tasks associated with roles and responsibilities helps to identify the skill sets needed to ensure the right people come to the table. The creation of a steering committee is described as one way to help gain access to the community, foster cooperation, and increase engagement.

This article examines a 5-year collaboration between the Stockholm-based video artists Performing Pictures and Talleres Comunitarios, a studio based in the Oaxacan town of Santa Ana Zegache where local artisans employ traditional skills in the restoration of religious artifacts. In images and text, we trace the exchange of skills, knowledge, and aesthetic sensibility that took place as these two groups of artists collaborated in producing a series of video animations of venerative objects, against a backdrop of religious, social, and political tensions that characterize everyday life in Zegache. In the article and the accompanying series of three short films, ''Wonder & Veneration 13'' (http://vimeo. com/album/2682070), we examine how the artists negotiate questions of aesthetics and religious belief as their collaboration unfolds within the context of the Zegache community, where the Talleres contribute skills of carpentry and painting, while Performing Pictures provides skills of film, animation and micro-electronics. The processes and practices involved in creating three works provides the framework for this examination: the first, an animation of the Virgin of Guadalupe as she appears to a simple peasant, and the second, produced 2 years later, an animation of Santa Ana, local patron saint and mother of Maria, as she teaches her daughter to read the scriptures. Whereas both figures are central to the syncretic religious belief of southern Mexico with its challenge to the entrenched authority of the hispanicized clergy, the local figure of Santa Ana carries even more complex meanings for the community of Zegache. These meanings are embodied in the third work we examine, a small solarpowered chapel that the artists built to display the Santa Ana animation. With the mayor's support and located at the entrance to the town, the chapel embodies a shift of power away from the church, standing as an example of indigenous empowerment in civil society. ; Changing Places: Local and global events as mediated through screen practices in public space ; Euroaxacan Initiative for Transformative Culture

Abstract
Discussion-based courses in international relations rely on students' careful reading of complex texts in advance of class. However, instructors face a perennial problem: many students do not read effectively, or at all. We argue that students often want to, but do not always know how to, read such material effectively. With instruction and guidance on effective reading strategies, students can improve reading comprehension. To test our hypotheses, we measure the effects of (1) receiving course-preparation assignment worksheets (CPAs), (2) receiving critical/active reading strategies instruction, or (3) receiving both interventions (1) and (2) on students' consumption of reading assignments and reading comprehension. Across four sections of an "International Security Studies" course, we tested our hypotheses using student self-assessment. Results indicate that both CPAs and reading strategies instruction increase student consumption and self-assessed comprehension of assigned material, but with intriguing nuance across the range of possible responses. Generally, no added benefit upon comprehension is realized by offering both treatments together. These effective reading strategies offer benefits beyond our classroom, imparting students with long-lasting skills and offering instructors easily adaptable activities for use in other courses.

In order for novice evaluators to gauge the success of their evaluations, the ability to identify and recognize indicators of buy-in is an essential skill. While much is written in the evaluation literature about strategies to build buy-in, the indicators of buy-in are largely overlooked. This article shares strategies used for building buy-in from a multi-state evaluation of cardiac care. Indicators of the success of these strategies are then shared with an emphasis on simple, unobtrusive, robust measures that novice evaluators can use to assess stakeholder engagement and responsiveness. Four indicators of buy-in include: timeliness to evaluation team requests; quality and quantity of feedback received; interaction with decision-makers; and investment of in-kind contributions. Awareness of these indicators can boost confidence and authority for students who are new to the field of evaluation. A tracking tool is also showcased which serves as a systematic, responsive prompt to monitor buy-in. The value of the tracking tool is realized in its ability to alert evaluators to potential problems for which corrective actions can be made, assist evaluators in creating realistic expectations, and enhance confidence in evaluation proceedings.