The Council on Linkages Between Academia and Public Health Practice (Council on Linkages) held its second meeting of the year on June 24th. More than 130 Council on Linkages members and friends participated in this virtual meeting to discuss current Council on Linkages initiatives and plans for the future.

Leadership for the Council on Linkages is provided by an elected Chair. C. William Keck, MD, MPH, Council on Linkages representative for the American Public Health Association (APHA), has served in this role since 1998 and is stepping down after 26 years of service. Amy Lee, MD, MPH, MBA, Council on Linkages representative for the Association for Prevention Teaching and Research and MPH Program Director, Consortium of Eastern Ohio Master of Public Health, Northeast Ohio Medical University, has been elected incoming Chair. Transition of this leadership position will take place over the coming months, and Dr. Keck will remain on the Council on Linkages as APHA’s representative. The Council on Linkages is deeply grateful to Dr. Keck for his years of dedicated service and welcomes Dr. Lee to her new position.

Advocacy is a critical skill as the public health field continues to rebuild the workforce in response to the COVID-19 pandemic and in preparation for the future. To help build these skills, the Lerner Center for Public Health Advocacy (Lerner Center) at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and the de Beaumont Foundation have launched the Public Health Advocacy Consensus Task Force (PH-ACT). The PH-ACT aims to build a stronger, more effective advocacy competency training to improve public health policy at the federal, state, and local levels. Through this initiative, the Lerner Center and de Beaumont Foundation are partnering with other national and state public health organizations to gain consensus on the definition of public health advocacy, identify essential advocacy skills needed to operationalize that definition, and draft guidance that could help schools and programs. The PH-ACT will engage in a rigorous consensus-building process to do so and has invited the Council on Linkages and its member organizations to participate.

Planning is well underway for the newest initiative of the Council on Linkages, the Retention and Recruitment (R&R) Learning Community. The R&R Learning Community will explore and address factors influencing public health workforce retention and recruitment, equipping public health agencies with valuable tools and resources for these crucial aspects of public health practice. The R&R Workgroup, consisting of over 60 members from health departments, academic institutions, and national organizations, is guiding development of the Learning Community, and the first meeting of the Learning Community is anticipated this fall. For more information about the R&R Learning Community, please visit the R&R Learning Community webpage or contact Mayela Arana at marana@phf.org. 

With more than 1,500 members from across the country, the Academic Health Department (AHD) Learning Community continues to support organizations in developing, sustaining, and expanding AHD partnerships, with recent activities focused around providing learning experiences. AHD partnerships were highlighted in a webinar, The Public Health Camp – Building an Academic-to-Practice Pipeline at Public Health – Seattle & King County, in April 2024 and during an Association of State and Territorial Health Officials’ Workforce Pop-Up webinar and a town hall session at the 2024 Public Health Improvement Training (PHIT) in June. AHD partnerships will also be the topic of an invited presentation in September 2024 for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Planning is underway for future webinars in the AHD Webinar Series, as well as sessions at the 2024 Public Health Learning Forum and American Public Health Association (APHA) Annual Meeting this October. For more information about the AHD Learning Community, please visit the AHD Learning Community webpage or contact Mayela Arana at marana@phf.org. 

The Council on Linkages continues efforts to raise awareness and support implementation of the Core Competencies for Public Health Professionals (Core Competencies). Examples of how health departments are using the Core Competencies for workforce development were shared during a webinar in May 2024 and sessions at PHIT in June 2024. The Core Competencies will also feature in sessions at the Public Health Learning Forum in October, as well as a session at the APHA Annual Meeting, Using the Core Competencies to Better Prepare for a Career in Public Health. In addition, a new resource describing the relationship between the Core Competencies, 10 Essential Public Health Services, and Foundational Public Health Services is now available. This and other resources and tools supporting use of the Core Competencies are available online. For more information about the Core Competencies, please visit the Core Competencies webpage or contact Mayela Arana at marana@phf.org. 

Since releasing the revised Applied Epidemiology Competencies (AECs) last year, the Council of State and Territorial Epidemiologists (CSTE) has been developing tools and trainings to facilitate use of that competency set. CSTE has recently developed a new toolkit and trainings to accompany the 2023 AECs. The toolkit includes materials to support implementation of the AECs in state, tribal, local, and territorial jurisdictions, as well as a crosswalk with the Council on Education for Public Health accreditation criteria for schools and programs of public health. Trainings focus on an introduction to the AECs and using the AECs for recruitment and retention.

• Registration is now open for the 2024 Public Health Learning Forum. Focused on Workforce Development in Action, sessions will highlight training and tools to support public health workforce development and build governmental public health workforce capacity, including the Core Competencies and AHD partnerships. The event is free and will be held virtually from October 15-18, 2024.
• The next Council on Linkages meeting will be on September 16, 2024 from 2-4pm ET.

Additional information about the meeting, including the agenda and other meeting materials, is available on the meeting webpage.