P/PV Program Areas | Community Health | Publications

Other Publications

A Portrait of Preteens in Santa Clara and San Mateo Counties: What We Know About 9- to 13-Year Olds

Adult Communication and Teen Sex: Changing a Community

Children's Futures' First Five Years: Lessons and Early Outcomes of a Community Change Initiative

Collaboration and Community Change in the Children's Futures Initiative

Copy That: Guidelines for Replicating Programs to Prevent Teen Pregnancy

Early Outcomes for Programs and Families in Children's Futures

Faith in Action: Using Interfaith Coalitions to Support Voluntary Caregiving Efforts

Linking the Child Care and Health Care Systems: A Consideration of Options

Plain Talk: Addressing Adolescent Sexuality Through A Community Initiative: A Final Evaluation Report Prepared for The Annie E. Casey Foundation

Promoting Emotional and Behavioral Health in Preteens: Benchmarks of Success and Challenges Among Programs in Santa Clara and San Mateo Counties

Resident Involvement in Community Change: The Experiences of Two Initiatives

The Plain Talk Implementation Guide

The Plain Talk Planning Year: Mobilizing Communities to Change. A Report Prepared for The Annie E. Casey Foundation

The Power of Plain Talk: Exploring One Program's Influence on the Adolescent Reproductive Health Field

Walking the Plain Talk: A Guide for Trainers

Growing What Works: Lessons Learned from Pennsylvania's Nurse-Family Partnership Initiative

by Jennifer Collins Stavrakos and Geri Summerville with Laura E. Johnson
September 2009, 42 pages

In 2001, P/PV was asked to oversee the statewide replication of the Nurse-Family Partnership in Pennsylvania—one of the largest and most successful expansions of this well regarded home-visiting program, which has been found to produce substantial and enduring improvements in the health and well-being of low-income first-time parents and their children. Our experience in Pennsylvania has shown that the replication of evidence-based models can be an enormous challenge, even for highly defined and effective programs like Nurse-Family Partnership. Replication across many sites simultaneously, and by a common funder, is labor-intensive and comes with expectations of outcomes similar to those achieved in research trials. As a result, ensuring fidelity to the established program model, while allowing for local innovation, is paramount to success.

Using the Pennsylvania Nurse-Family Partnership experience as a case study, this report provides key lessons for policymakers and funders interested in bringing proven models to a statewide scale, including best practices for selecting implementing agencies; fostering a sense of community among geographically dispersed sites; monitoring program results to promote quality; and engaging local administrators and site leaders.

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