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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.

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Extreme Recruitment for Foster Care and Adoption (Missouri)

Filed under Good Idea, Health / Children's Health, Children, Teens

Goal: The goal of the Extreme Recruitment program is to use MFCAA's expertise in facilitating adoption and kinship placement to find permanent, successful forever homes for foster children who would otherwise remain in foster care or residential treatment until adulthood.

Impact: In its pilot year, the program successfully placed 22 children in permanent homes.

Families Learning and Growing (F.L.A.G.ship) (Marin)

Filed under Good Idea, Education / Literacy, Families

Goal: The program's goal is to provide school readiness activities for families with children, from birth to five years old, who live in isolated and under-served areas of Marin County.

Family and Children's Services: Co-locating to Provide Trauma Services (Nashville, TN)

Filed under Good Idea, Health / Mental Health & Mental Disorders, Children, Families

Goal: The goal oft his program is to provide direct services to children who have suffered or witnessed violence in their homes or neighborhoods.

Family Health Promotion (Tuscon, AZ)

Filed under Effective Practice, Community / Social Environment, Children, Families, Urban

Goal: The goal of the FHP program is to seek seeks to reduce risk factors and increase protective factors in the child and family domains.

Farm 2 School Lunch Program (Kansas and Missouri)

Filed under Good Idea, Health / Physical Activity, Children

Goal: The goal of the Farm 2 School program is to improve the health and wellbeing of school-aged children and prevent childhood obesity by providing healthy, seasonal, and locally grown meals to children at school.

Father Friendly Initiative (Boston)

Filed under Effective Practice, Community / Social Environment, Adults, Urban

Goal: The goal of the Father Friendly Initiative is to work with low or no income fathers to improve their health and social well being in order to increase involvement with their children and communities.

Father/Male Involvement Preschool Teacher Education Program (Urbana, IL)

Filed under Effective Practice, Community / Social Environment, Children, Families

Goal: The goal of this program was to increase father/male involvement in state-funded preschool programs for at-risk students.

Federal Electronics Challenge (USA)

Filed under Good Idea, Environmental Health / Toxins & Contaminants

Goal: The goal of the FEC is to empower federal agencies to achieve cost-effective, environmentally responsible electronics management throughout the product life cycle. This goal will be achieved in part by:
- Promoting ENERGY STAR® features.
- Extending the life span of equipment.
- Increasing the recovery rate and expanding the recycling infrastructure for electronics.
- Utilizing the concept of supply and demand to promote environmentally preferable electronic equipment.
- Reducing the volume and toxicity of electronic equipment waste.

Feet First (Seattle, WA)

Filed under Good Idea, Health / Physical Activity

Goal: The goals of this organization are to promote the rights and interests of pedestrians and to encourage walking.

Fight The Bite Colorado (Tri-County, CO)

Filed under Effective Practice, Health / Immunizations & Infectious Diseases

Goal: The goal of this program is to prevent the spread of this illness and protect human lives.

An Effective Practice meets the following HCI criteria:

  1. The program description includes at a minimum: the sponsoring organization, program goals, program implementation steps, and outcomes that have demonstrated program success and/or promise in achieving the program goal in one or more localities.
  2. The results from an evaluation of the program include quantitative measures of improvement in outcome of interest (i.e. increase in voter registration, not just delivery of voter registration drive) and/ or the outcome measure is increased or improved compared to the baseline measurement or the control group but the difference is not statistically significant.

A Good Idea meets the following HCI criteria:

  1. The program description includes: the sponsoring organization, program goals, program funding source, program implementation steps and outcomes.
  2. The program evaluation is limited to descriptive measure(s) of success/accomplishment (i.e., program participation rates, number of services/education sessions/radio messages provided). Note: oftentimes, the program has been newly implemented and a program evaluation has not yet been conducted. Programs that have not yet been evaluated, but which show promise in improving health or quality of life, are classified as Good Ideas until an evaluation is conducted.

An Evidence-Based Practice meets the following HCI criteria:

  1. The program description includes at a minimum: the sponsoring organization, program goals, program implementation steps, and outcomes that have demonstrated program success in achieving the program goal in one or more localities.
  2. The results from an evaluation of the program include quantitative measures showing improvement in the outcome(s) of interest after the implementation of the program (i.e. increase in smoking cessation, not just the delivery of a smoking cessation program). The outcome measure(s) is/are compared at relevant time periods before and after the intervention or program implementation. Alternatively, the evaluation study compares the outcome(s) between an intervention group and an appropriate control group.
  3. The study is of peer-review quality and presents numbers in a scientific manner; measurements of precision and reliability are included (e.g. confidence intervals, standard errors), results from statistical tests show a significant difference or change in the outcome measure(s), and relevant point estimates and p-values are presented. Note: if the results from an evaluation of a program are presented in a scientific manner and the outcome measure is improved compared to the baseline measurement or the control group but the difference is not statistically significant, the practice is classified as effective and not evidence-based.