Background
The National Network of Public Health Institutes, Inc. (NNPHI)
Mobilizing 51-member public health institutes with over $2.2 billion in annual funding, NNPHI connects more than 12,000 subject matter experts with organizational partners across the nation. With an expansive organizational presence and activities across all 50 states, the national network is a go-to resource for analysis and best practices. NNPHI also provides important network connections for communities, government agencies, foundations, the health care delivery system, media, and academia.
Overview of the Public Health Infrastructure Grant (PHIG)
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC’s) Public Health Infrastructure Grant (PHIG) is a groundbreaking investment supporting critical public health infrastructure. Funding from this grant is designed to ensure that health departments have the people, resources, and systems they need to assess, promote, and protect health in the communities they serve. Funding was awarded to 107 state, local, and territorial health departments (“recipients”) and three national public health partners (“National Partners”); it will be distributed over a five-year period (12/1/2022 – 11/30/2027). The purpose of PHIG is to implement activities that strengthen public health outcomes, utilizing a funding model that gives health departments the flexibility to direct funds towards specific organizational and community needs. The PHIG National Partners, consisting of the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials (ASTHO), National Network of Public Health Institutes (NNPHI), and Public Health Accreditation Board (PHAB), support the work of the funded health departments by providing training and technical assistance, evaluating the overall grant, and facilitating coordination and communication across recipients and CDC. The CDC PHIG website provides maps to visualize the funded jurisdictions.
NNPHI’s Training and Technical Assistance (TA)
As one of the PHIG National Partners, NNPHI provides two types of technical assistance (TA) to PHIG recipients with the purpose of building recipients’ overall capacity to implement measurable and sustainable process and system improvements at their agencies. First, responsive TA allows PHIG recipients to submit a request for on-demand direct assistance with their PHIG workplan activities. The second type of TA is proactive, which aims to address the needs of several recipients at once in a more strategic manner. Responsive TA may take the form of resource sharing; feedback or input on documents, processes, plans, etc.; training delivery; coaching; or additional hands-on support like facilitating strategic planning sessions or making workforce development plans actionable. Proactive TA is delivered in the form of trainings and webinars; peer networks and communities of practice; resource development and dissemination; and convenings.
AI Peer Learning Series
NNPHI is seeking qualified organizations for the provision of a peer learning series on using artificial intelligence (AI) for public health efforts. This peer learning series will be a form of proactive technical assistance and will be made accessible to all PHIG recipients that could benefit from and contribute to a shared learning environment.
NNPHI is the Project ECHO for Public Health Superhub. Project ECHO® is a peer learning framework that follows the mindset of “all teach, all learn,” which allows participants to engage their virtual community to share and receive support, guidance, and feedback. This framework also allows participants to grow a collective understanding of how to disseminate and implement best practices on a given topic. As a Superhub, NNPHI translates the ECHO model from the clinical environment to public health practice, trains and supports organizations to develop their own public health-related ECHOs, and funds relevant ECHO projects when possible. For more than five years, NNPHI and its partners have utilized the ECHO model for many public health topics. For more information about NNPHI’s Project ECHO for Public Health Superhub and the ECHO model, please visit our website.
Ideally, this peer learning series would be executed by an ECHO certified hub (an organization that has successfully completed an ECHO Partner Launch Training) and operate as an ECHO series. However, NNPHI will accept proposals from organizations who are not certified ECHO hubs if their proposals demonstrate strong facilitation skills that promote heightened engagement and bidirectional learning.
Guidance on Training Description, Content, & Delivery Format Overview
The following information provides general guidance for this peer learning series. NNPHI recommends the organization that wins this RFP (“Awardee”) to utilize the following training delivery structure.
Structure
The peer learning series should include:
- Five to six 90-minute sessions using a virtual meeting platform (e.g., Zoom).
- An experienced facilitator who can foster engagement, interaction, and create a space for shared learning between PHIG recipients during each session.
- An ECHO model session structure that includes a didactic presentation on a session topic, a case study or example aligned with the session topic, and group discussion(s).
Previous successful peer learning series have followed this agenda:
- Welcome and housekeeping
- 15-to-20-minute didactic presentation provided by a subject matter expert (SME)
- 10-minute case study presentation or real-life example from a public health agency
- Questions from group to presenters
- Group discussion on session topic (or break into small group discussions, depending on attendance size)
- Closing (if small group discussions, reconvene to report out on biggest takeaways)
The Didactic Portion
As the increased use of AI and application of AI in public health continues to grow, there is a need for public health agencies to better understand the fundamentals of creating an ethical, responsible AI policy and various use cases for applying AI to their work. Each peer learning session should have a different AI-related topic. Recognizing AI is a general-purpose technology and the audience is PHIG-funded health departments (a non-research grant), applicants are encouraged to consider the most practical applications of AI for this peer learning series. While NNPHI will consider any topics that seem relevant for practical implementation by health departments, applicants are encouraged to frame proposed topic suggestions in terms of relevance to specific foundational capabilities of health departments as well as alignment with the pillars and cross-cutting enablers referenced in the most recent HHS AI Strategy (see Artificial Intelligence (AI) Strategy v3).
Topic examples may include ethical use of AI in public health practice; the impacts of AI use on the environment, public health, and the workforce; creating an AI policy for a public health agency; and various use cases for AI in public health practice, such as for electronic case reporting (eCR), environmental health reporting, syndromic surveillance, communicable disease outbreak predictions, data analytics and modeling (i.e., geospatial predictive analytics), data analysis, data visualization, qualitative research thematic analysis, public health administrative and operational efficiency, strategic planning, or communications. Proposed session topics must be approved by NNPHI, to assure relevance to PHIG recipients and to prevent duplication of efforts related to other proactive TA offered. For example, an AI policy development toolkit was recently created as proactive TA, therefore any peer learning sessions on AI policy development should align with the existing guidance from the toolkit.
The didactic portion should be presented by a subject matter expert who can make complex ideas easy to understand for a wide range of public health professionals, set the stage for robust conversation, and have clear explanations and practical guidance. This could be a team member of the Awardee, or this could be a guest speaker that the Awardee recruits and provides an honorarium. Please note that the didactic presentations may be recorded for sharing purposes among other PHIG recipients.
The Case Study or Example
The case study or example aligned to the session topic should be provided by a participant, which allows jurisdictions to learn from each other in a more practical, realistic manner. In previous peer learning series, we have often heard that the didactic portion and subject matter expert sets the stage, but the case study portion really brings the topic to life. The Awardee will oversee recruiting PHIG recipients to share case studies and/or present their experiences on the topic.
The Discussion Portion
Engaged discussions are the hallmark of the ECHO Model. As with all virtual communities, some participants drop off during the discussion portion of a call. However, some participants thrive in group discussions. During this peer learning series, the Awardee will equip participants with questions or prompts to promote robust dialogue and discussion during breakout sessions or group discussion.
Scope of Work
The Awardee will collaborate with the NNPHI PHIG technical assistance team on this project. The Awardee will execute the following phases of this peer learning series.
