Affiliates in Brief

New Jersey Affiliate advises on climate

The New Jersey Public Health Association is helping a state university create an advisory group on the health effects of climate change.

As part of the Public Health Associations’ Collaborative Effort, the New Jersey association is advising staff at Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey, in creating the New Jersey Climate Change and Public Health Working Group. Other members of the collaborative effort are the New Jersey Association of County and City Health Officials, the New Jersey Local Boards of Health Association, the New Jersey Environmental Health Association, the New Jersey Society for Public Health Education and New Jersey Association of Public Health Nursing Administrators.

The working group, a subgroup of the New Jersey Climate Adaptation Alliance, is focused on building public health considerations into the conversation on climate change, said Kevin McNally, MBA, NJPHA president.

“It’s the whole principle of ‘think globally, act locally,’” McNally told The Nation’s Health. “Everybody got quite a wake-up with Hurricane Sandy because we hadn’t had a big hurricane in a lot of years.”

The working group is developing a report about the public health impacts of climate change in New Jersey, which should be completed by the end of the year, McNally said.

Iowa Affiliate begins first mentor program

A new Iowa Public Health Association program aims to prepare people new to public health or in new roles in their public health career through the guidance of experienced professionals.

The IPHA Mentorship Pilot Program, which launched in summer 2015, matches IPHA members who are new and mid-career public health professionals with members who have spent decades in public health.

IPHA members identified the mentoring program as a need with the increasing number of retirements in the state’s public health workforce, said Jeneane Moody, MPH, IPHA’s executive director.

“We found there was quite a demand to be mentored as a new administrator of a public health agency,” Moody told The Nation’s Health. “There are a lot of new administrators at local public health agencies at a time when local public health is changing dramatically.”

To gauge interest in being a mentor and mentee, IPHA sent out a member survey and asked about their career in public health and practice area. The association, which matched nine pairs in the first cohort in November, also curated a guidebook for pairs to use.

An evaluation of the first cohort was in progress as of April and a second cohort will launch in the fall, Moody said.

New Hampshire folds in research group

A New Hampshire research group is now the state public health association’s newest specialty member group.

The New Hampshire Research and Evaluation Group now falls under the umbrella of the New Hampshire Public Health Association.

The APHA Affiliate took over task management for the group, which is a home for state researchers and evaluators to collaborate on data collection, learn new skills and get feedback on projects.

Having a specialty member group has been a long-term goal for the New Hampshire Public Health Association, said Katie Robert, MPA, NHPHA president.

Members of the group will now have dual membership in both the New Hampshire Research and Evaluation Group and the New Hampshire Public Health Association.

The move also means more research-centered professional development opportunities for New Hampshire Affiliate members.