“Individual commitment to a group effort, that is what makes a team work, a company work, a society work, a civilization work."   -Vincent Thomas "Vince" Lombardi TABLE OF CONTENTS Welcome Priority focus Choosing the cast Reading the director's notes Selling at the box office Opening night Resource spotlight A helping hand Resources and links Get the facts from ttac! Just out! Coming soon! Special thanks ttac exchange staff

Collaboration has been a tobacco control tactic for as far back as I can remember. Yet, there’s still so much to learn about how to achieve effective collaborative relationships that result in communities that address widespread public health and social priorities that will help us and future generations live healthier, and enjoy a higher quality of life.

We have all heard it, one hundred and one times, know your audience—whether it’s for a presentation, a board meeting, or performance—there’s no way around it . . . nor should there be if you want true success. Forming an effective collaborative is no different . . . it’s all about coming together for mutual learning and respect.

I’d like to say that we have all the answers in this issue of ttac exchange, but we don’t. What we do have are the tools and examples and, most importantly, the linkages you need for a fresh breath to develop a new, or fine-tune an existing, collaborative.

As always, we’re here to bring you the voice from the field, to shake up the way we do business and get those creative juices flowing, which serve tobacco control so well. Let’s continue to strive to get out of the one-person-show and back into a full-cast production to realize a future with lower rates of chronic disease and social injustice.

Dearell Niemeyer, MPH
Director, Tobacco Technical Assistance Consortium

The National Coalition for LGBT Health was formed three years ago following the release of Healthy People 2010. Their goal today is the same as it was then: to impact federal policy around funding their programs and the inclusion of LGBT populations in data collection. To that end, they gather research and aim to increase access to and quality of health care services offered to the LGBT community.

ttac spoke with Donald Hitchcock to learn more about how the coalition sets the stage for successful collaboration.

Tell us a little about the structure of the National Coalition.

Ours is an open process—anyone can join. Presently, we have almost 60 member organizations—including community based organizations, city and state health departments, LGBT health clinics and community centers—along with about 30 individual members.

We are structured into four working groups: (1) Access, Research, and Education, (2) Cultural Competence, (3) Eliminating Disparities (e.g. focusing on underserved populations such as low income, aging, or people of color),
and (4) Policy.

What is the key to keeping all parties fixed on a shared vision?

The key is keeping it fresh and interesting and always raising the bar. We manage to keep everyone focused on the shared vision by making the coalition members feel welcome and listened to.

Does tobacco control have a place among the various health issues faced by the LGBT community?

We’ve seen a lot of energy around the LGBT anti-tobacco effort. At our last biannual meeting (which focused primarily on educating around health disparities among the transgender community and our lobbying efforts), we tacked-on a 2-day workshop devoted entirely to tobacco control action planning. All attendees were given the option to stay for the special workshop, and half of them elected to stay.

During the workshop, we used an internet-based software tool that guides teams through a goal-focused process to organize ideas, make decisions, and develop action items. Everyone had a laptop computer, which enabled us to capture our discussion in real-time. Four top priority categories emerged from this process: prevention, treatment, research and policy.

We then took the next step and examined each specific priority with respect to feasibility, and had participants work independently on their action plans. Our next steps will involve bringing people together to foster support so folks can follow their plans.

The National Coalition for LGBT Health is a considerable size. Can you comment on the particular benefits of collaborating with 50 plus organizations?

• We have access to higher level policymakers than we would individually. When a federal agency receives a letter on the coalition’s letterhead with the names of 60 member organizations, we get a quicker response because we are acting as a national voice.
• A large collaborative, such as this, engenders a sense of comfort and security—there’s a shared sense that someone is looking out for them and their interests at the national level.
• It’s a terrific central resource that members can plug in to at any time and feel empowered.

How do you ensure parity among the groups who participate in your coalition?

• Our meeting agenda is carefully planned in advance, to ensure parity among groups,
• We make the program and the workgroups diverse enough to address multiple needs.
• We hold a caucus breakfast the first morning of the meeting—this has worked well for us. People can join affinity tables such as: people of color; transgender communities; health departments; community based organizations; and, community partners.

Share with our readers some practical advice that will serve them well.

Don’t underestimate the strength of consistency and presence. Every year we have Health Awareness Week, we are on the Hill every six months, and we are in e-mail boxes every week. It’s a slow and steady progress which allows us to create movement in multiple communities.

Back to Table of Contents
 

It’s all about the flexibility of the cast. The larger your repertoire the broader an audience you have the potential to reach.

Jennifer Stalley, Project Director, South Dakota Tobacco Free Kids Network

“We wanted organizations and people who shared our vision and geared our search toward traditional partners and like-minded organizations and people. Our initial recruitment was done on a one-by-one basis and we have been generally successful with a network that is representative of our population.

Our keys to success include building relationships with members, demonstrating victories, and valuing member contributions equally. Our Network is maintained by developing a relationship with our member organizations—each year we personally visit each member, enabling us to share information and offer support.”

Shirley Duma, California Healthy Cities and Communities

“We bring people together to see how their issues fit in with the whole idea of community health and livability for the long term. The keys are to pool resources, share power, and trust in the decision-making process to achieve enriched outcomes. When done well, collaboration achieves not only the one objective it set out to accomplish (removing all tobacco industry billboards from the city) but it also generates additional positive results (school district leaders take the step to reject tobacco industry funding).

When embarking on a new coalition or expanding an existing one, it’s always worth it to step back and survey who else is doing this work. Do your homework and know what work adds the greatest value, and build strategies from there. Keep in mind that you have to assume the role of expert and learner—“turf battles” inevitably lead the group away from the goal of collaboration. This is a tough dynamic that sometimes requires putting the expert hat away to actively listen.”

Back to Table of Contents
 

We all want the Broadway hit, but we don’t always get one. Good direction and a collaborative approach can move you closer to the mark . . .

Patricia Renee Massie, Lincoln-Lancaster County Health Department, represented the health department on a collaborative effort to achieve 100% smokefree workplace policies in Lincoln, Nebraska.

“The ordinance was brought forth by the Board of Health, a member of the Tobacco Free Coalition. A collaborative approach seemed to make sense—tobacco control is a public health issue and the more smokefree environments results in fewer youth using tobacco. The organizations involved share common goals of protecting workers and the public from secondhand smoke, and preventing youth initiation.

To be true, the ordinance actually didn’t turn out as we originally planned—it was diluted, got confusing, and missed the 100% smokefree target. However, the collaborative effort did bring success by raising the level of community awareness and activism, and uniting many powerful local agencies and groups, including physicians.

We have also enjoyed a number of benefits from working through a collaborative:

• An increase in the number of advocates due to the number and range of organizations involved;
• A common and consistent theme and message which makes our goals, in terms of policy change, clear to the City Council; and
• A camaraderie that has carried us through tough times. For example, we all maintained a ‘no matter what’ stance which really helped sustain us when we lost funding.

The key to a strong, focused and successful collaboration is communication—to keep everyone informed in the decision-making process.”

Aida McCammon, Indiana Latino Institute knows first-hand about the cultural aspects of collaboration.

“Our greatest challenge is how to best address tobacco use within the context of our community. Best practices for Latinos in the US are limited and our community is at varying levels of acculturation and assimilation and of English fluency and knowledge of advocacy.

Prior to our organization, the needs of the Latino population in Indiana were not being adequately addressed; there was no comprehensive program addressing tobacco control or other needs for Latinos. In November 2000, the National Latino Council on Alcohol and Tobacco Prevention sponsored a statewide Latino forum on tobacco control. The forum was a breakthrough in that it brought together many participants from around the state, as well as representatives from the CDC, The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, and other foundations. It was the first forum related to tobacco control for Latinos in the US, and people were very excited and engaged because of it.

Working as a collaborative enhances our creativity, gives us the opportunity to connect throughout the state, provides a rich opportunity for us to learn from one another, and helps us address differences in new and productive ways.”

Back to Table of Contents
 

You need to sell tickets to the show, to keep it going—this means targeting your energies and making the linkages that will work.

Linking tobacco control and business priorities—a collaborative worth exploring.

Alan “Chip” Chambers is a former volunteer at Smoke Free Allen County, where he worked directly with management and union employees to help them develop and implement smokefree policies within their factories. He is a volunteer worker and co-facilitator for Cancer Services of Allen County, Inc. In addition to his volunteer work, Chip is president of Rubber Industry Buyer’s Alliance Incorporated; a cooperative of manufacturing concerns.

Chip is a current fellow with the Advocacy Institute and shared with ttac his perspective on how to partner with the traditional business community, specifically the manufacturing sector which he considers the last frontier in tobacco control.

“Business owners worry about how to lower costs, how to make their company more productive, and how to make their company more attractive to potential employees. A natural linkage is going smokefree and encouraging cessation, which would ultimately lower health insurance costs and increase productivity due to lower absenteeism. But more than that, most companies are interested in being a “best practice” organization; they want to be good corporate citizens, create good will in the community and build up “social capital”. For retail industry this is imperative, but it is also important for those sectors which are not in the public eye. Tobacco control advocates need to emphasize these linkages too.

When collaborating with the business community, be realistic. Make every effort to see the landscape. Look at the situation through the business leader’s eyes and within the business framework. Business leaders are very pragmatic; they want to know what works for their business—be realistic.”
–Chip Chambers, Rubber Industry Buyer’s Alliance Incorporated

Back to Table of Contents
 

The curtain goes up and that means you have to be ready to perfect your craft and connect with your audience as best you know how, for a command performance.

Have a front row seat to the structure and success of these collaborations:

• California Tobacco Control Alliance
• South Dakota Tobacco Free Kids Network
  

Briefly describe how the Alliance got started.

§ Our group started as an informal coalition in 1996 working on youth access, entertainment industry issues and other tobacco control priorities. In 1999 we began to evolve toward a primary focus on increasing access to cessation services in California. Our approach was to bring together representatives of non-traditional partners from within the healthcare industry.

At that time, more than 65% of people with health insurance in California were in the managed care delivery system. Since we were looking to have the greatest possible impact on the delivery of cessation services, we decided to work with the top six managed care plans in the state, and in doing so we had access to 85% of all HMO-insured Californians. Previous to this, managed care had not been among the traditional tobacco control programs, so our effort was unique in that way.

What prompted you to take a collaborative approach to tobacco control?

As our group began to form, we realized we needed more than just the HMO perspective, so we reached out to include two large private employers in California - Chevron/Texaco and Kaiser/General Motors. Also, since medical groups are the systems that ultimately deliver patient care, we included them, as well. And we didn’t stop there. We reached out to trade associations, provider associations, advocacy groups and even academics. This unprecedented mix of non-traditional partners constituted a unique approach to cessation.

Was there a single unifying factor for this unusually diverse group?

While our group was unusually diverse—often on opposite sides of many issues—we were all united behind the public health service guidelines, which served as our focal point. Essentially, the guidelines demonstrated that reducing smoking, improving health and saving money was doable. What’s more, they provided an opportunity for self-analysis and we started there.

Talk with us about how collaboratives, like yours, can impact healthcare systems.

Over the course of a few years, our group established some important system changes. Specifically, we talk about our system change strategy as a 3-legged stool:

1. Increase access to cessation services by increasing coverage at the managed care level
2. Increase capacity of healthcare provider system to deliver cessation services
3. Ensure consumer demand for cessation services

To help meet the third goal of ensuring consumer demand, we recently launched a new campaign called Smoking Cessation Benefits Everyone. Since we know that health plans are historically resistant to mandates, we decided to try incentive health plans to make changes, voluntarily, by putting positive pressure on the front end. To that end, we took a 2-pronged approach:

• First, we launched a grassroots effort through our Web site, www.cessationbenefitseveryone.org, where Californians can sign their name to an electronic letter that gets sent to insurance company executives saying that cessation services are important and should be included in standard insurance benefit packages (most employer currently do not offer cessation benefits).
• Second, we are conducting key informant interviews with key businesses and health care purchasers in various sectors to assess: (1) which benefits they feel are most important to offer their employees and (2) what drives their benefit purchasing practices. We have interviewed 15 geographically diverse businesses of various sizes from multiple industries to assess the value they place on employee requests, cost of services, return on investment, or something else. This information will inform us regarding our strategies for approaching employers and employees.

How do you evaluate the effectiveness of your collaborative?

• In 2003, we conducted a public opinion poll with insured Californians to assess their attitudes regarding cessation and the value of including cessation services in insurance plans.
• We created a tool kit, the contents of which are available at www.cessationcenter.org. The 25-page tool kit was distributed to 3,000 people statewide. The resource is also distributed through a speakers’ bureau, partner mailings, and select professional groups in our network.
• Lastly, we judge success by the fact that state coalitions, public health agencies, health care systems and other organizations have contacted us to get advice on how to start a similar collaborative, or to request our materials. That tells us that the word is out about the value of our resources, and we are thrilled to share them with others.

Back to “Opening Night” Menu
 

Tell us a little about how and why the Network came to be.

In 1998—funded by Master Settlement Agreement dollars and rooted in both public health wisdom and practical need—the South Dakota Tobacco Free Kids Network was born. Pulling this collaborative together really helped the organizations involved come together and learn from each other. The collaborative helped to develop a realistic mechanism for achieving goals, while presenting and maintaining a united front.

What basic structure does the Network operate under?

Our Network consists of 44 member organizations and over 1500 individual advocates. When our Network was new, we put a lot of thought into structure and original membership. What we came away with is a Network that is as versatile as it is diverse. Depending on the issue, some organizations may take a lead role and others a supportive role. We maintain a fair amount of flexibility within the structure itself, allowing organizations the space to commit to the Network’s goals, while staying true to individual agency resources and objectives.

How are Network goals chosen and priorities set?

A 13-member steering committee—consisting of 6 permanent seats and 7 at-large, elected seats—meets quarterly to adopt policy statements, which reflect the goals of the overall Network. These policy statements are then translated into legislative actions for the coming year. A member organization must endorse the policy statement as a condition of membership, thereby agreeing to the Network’s priorities.

Tell us how you think it’s been working.

Success is contagious; it attracts, maintains, and energizes members.
Each year, the Network has enjoyed significant legislative victory. During the 2000 legislative session, the Network encouraged the governor and the legislature to invest in a comprehensive tobacco prevention and control program. Additional funding was allocated in 2001. Another major step was taken in 2002 when the legislature passed the state’s first comprehensive clean indoor air law, which made most indoor worksites and public places smokefree. In 2003, the state’s excise tax on cigarettes was increased 20 cents per pack. These victories were achieved as a direct result of using a collaborative approach—we were a credible unified force.

Back to “Opening Night" Menu

Back to Table of Contents
 

Reaching Higher Ground: A Guide for Preventing, Preparing for, and Transforming Conflict for Tobacco Control Coalitions

No matter what your role is in the tobacco control movement, your energy is best spent developing and implementing well conceived plans of action that are unimpaired by conflict, contentious issues, or unnecessary bureaucratic processes. Yet, conflict is a very real challenge that many of us experience all too often as we face different policy priorities and approaches, integration of new partners with new perspectives, competition over compromised resources and capacity, and changes in leadership.

Reaching Higher Ground, by Frank Dukes, PhD, Director of the Institute of Environmental Negotiation at the University of Virginia, provides practical advice for tobacco control advocates who are collaborating with people and groups outside their own organizations on how to prevent, prepare for, and transform harmful conflict. This guide is intended to help leaders and potential leaders of tobacco control coalitions, coalition members who are concerned with their roles, and people who are facilitating coalition meetings to address conflict in ways that produce strong relationships, effective and powerful coalitions, and creative solutions.

The higher ground approach emphasizes high aspirations and principled behavior to help address differences and conflict in ways that bring people together rather than tear them apart. Reaching Higher Ground walks you through the fundamentals for effective collaboration and building consensus within your coalition. It helps you prepare your coalition in advance, so that when conflict arises you are equipped with a plan to address the problem swiftly and adeptly.

Hand-outs and practical tools include:

• Coalition Representation, Coalition Roles, and Member Responsibilities
• Working with Tribes
• Worksheet for Planning and Conducting Effective Meetings
• Coalition Meeting Facilitation
• The Role of the “Recorder”
• General Meeting/Event Evaluation
• Making Consensus Decisions
• Group Characteristics and Level of Effort to Build Shared Expectations for Higher Ground
• The Unspoken “Rules” of Groups
• What’s Your Coalition’s “Participant Involvement Score”?
• Conflict Resolution Capacity Inventory
• Sample Group Covenant
• Worksheet – Aspirations and Ground Rules
• Understanding Conflict Styles
• Active Listening and Paraphrasing: Reflecting Facts and Feelings
• A Continuum of Approaches to Conflict

This guide promises to help your community grow through conflict by engaging one another in ways that reach not only common ground…but higher ground.

Download an electronic copy or email ttac for a copy at ttac@sph.emory.edu.

Back to Table of Contents
 

Let ttac help you build and maintain a strong collaborative approach to addressing tobacco use. Consider the following that are available to you through ttac:

• Help identify ways to engage potential partners and get everyone sitting at the same table.
• Help identify an expert to facilitate a strategic planning process that meets stakeholder and tobacco control priorities.
• Match you with a consultant skilled in conflict resolution to help your collaborative rise above conflict.
• Point you to the latest information and materials on building and maintaining an effective partnership through our extensive inventory of resources available on the ttac Web site.

Back to Table of Contents
 

• General Resources/Background Information
• Dealing with Conflict
• Sustainability
• Identifying Partners
• Materials on Priority Populations
• Evaluating Collaboratives: Background
• Evaluating Collaboratives: Tips and Tools
• Tobacco Control Examples

Center for Civic Partnerships
The Center provides technical support and consultation services to help groups develop, implement, and sustain community improvements. The Center’s Web site offers tips and links to additional resources on collaboration, including building and maintaining collaborations, strategic planning, and sustainability.

Collaboration: A Strategy for Prevention Practitioners
This paper developed for the Center for Substance Abuse Prevention outlines the history, definitions, types, and stages of collaboration. Costs and benefits of collaborating are also discussed.

Collaborative Leadership Fieldbook: A Guide for Citizens and Civic Leaders
This 2002 book by David Chrislip, author of Collaborative Leadership: How Citizens and Civic Leaders Can Make a Difference, offers nonprofit practitioners, community leaders, and public officials a practical, hands-on resource.

Community Partners: Coalition Building: Resources and Tip Sheets
The Community Partners web site offers many tip sheets on coalition building from evaluating and sustaining evaluations, to engaging grassroots to overcoming barriers. From The Ground Up! A Workbook on Coalition Building and Community Development can also be ordered from this site.

Community Tool Box: Create and Maintain Coalitions and Partnerships
This section of Community Tool Box (CTB) offers an outline of steps to creating, expanding, and maintaining a community’s coalition or collaborative. The outline points to guidance, examples, and practical tools.

From the Ground Up: An Organizing Handbook for Healthy Communities
Developed by the Ontario Healthy Communities Coalition, this handbook provides guidance on developing coalitions, as well as an overview of the necessary skills to maintain coalitions such as communication, leadership, and negotiation.

Learning Center Tutorial: Build a Coalition
This ttac tutorial provides detailed guidance on the steps to creating and maintaining a coalition, including how to identify and involve members. The tutorial provides resources, examples, and worksheets.

Ohio State University Extension: Building Coalitions Fact sheets
This series of fact sheets on coalitions and collaboratives includes evaluation, turf issues, and working with diverse populations.

Wilder Foundation: Resources on Collaboration
The Amherst H. Wilder Foundation produces publications on collaboration for purchase, including Collaboration: What Makes It Work and Collaboration Handbook: Creating, Sustaining, and Enjoying the Journey. The Web site also includes a comprehensive resource list.

Back to the Resources and Links Table of Contents
 

Managing Collaboration Risks: Partnering with Confidence and Success
Created by the Nonprofits’ Insurance Alliance of California and Alliance of Nonprofits for Insurance, this guide for nonprofit organizations discusses the possible risks involved in collaborating with other nonprofits, government entities, and businesses. Checklists and questions are provided on preventing and managing risk before and during partnership.

Reaching Higher Ground: A Guide for Preventing, Preparing for, and Transforming Conflict for Tobacco Control Coalitions
This ttac guide provides practical advice for ways of working in coalitions and partnerships that resolve real problems while strengthening relationships. The tools and strategies described in this book can make any collaborative undertaking more successful by approaching problems and people in ways that impart dignity and respect.

Back to the Resources and Links Table of Contents
 

Community Tool Box: Sustain the Work or Initiative
This CTB resource offers a framework for planning for the long-term sustainability of a community initiative, including how to plan for the institutionalization of an initiative. It includes links to examples, tips, and additional resources.

Fostering Sustainable Collaborative Relationships
This 1999 Journal of Nonprofit Management article provides a summary of research on issues related to sustaining collaboratives, as well as key factors which influence the success and sustainability of collaboration within an agency and between agencies.

Sustainability Toolkit: 10 Steps to Maintain Your Community Improvements
This tool is produced by the Center for Civic Partnership and is available for purchase ($80) to help organizations create and implement sustainability planning. The toolkit's primary audiences are collaboratives and organizations working on community health improvement and community development initiatives.

Sustaining Community-Based Initiatives
The W.K. Kellogg Foundation and The Healthcare Forum prepared three modules designed to support community-based initiatives: Developing Community Capacity, Communicating with Policy Makers, and Community and Economic Development. The module on community capacity specifically addresses how to improve a community’s capacity for positive change by promoting citizen participation, action and leadership.

Back to the Resources and Links Table of Contents
 

Community-Based Public Health: Policy and Practice Policy Briefs
This series of policy briefs developed by the Partnership for Public Health include guidance on partnering with faith communities, law enforcement agencies, academia, and hospitals.

Community Tool Box: Developing Multisector Collaborations
This resource includes information on assessing a community’s readiness for multisector collaboration and tips on building and operating one.

Community Tool Box: Increase Participation and Membership
This CTB resource provides a framework on increasing participation and membership in a community initiative. The framework covers how to identify and recruit potential members from diverse organizations, as well as the importance of member recognition.

Guidance for Collaboration with the Private Sector
These guidelines developed by CDC for its employees to help evaluate the suitability of potential collaborations with the private sector can be applied to other public health initiatives. The Office on Smoking and Health adapted these broader guidelines to offer specific guidance related to dealing with tobacco industry.

Meeting the Collaboration Challenge: Developing Strategic Alliances Between Nonprofit Organizations and Businesses
This workbook developed by the Leader to Leader Institute provides guidance and worksheets for nonprofits that plan to develop partnerships with businesses. The workbook includes sample policies for alliances between nonprofit organizations and businesses.

Model Guidelines for Nonprofits: Evaluating Proposed Relationships with Other Organizations
Developed by the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, these guidelines for nonprofits are intended to address the most common practical and ethical concerns raised by relationships with and contributions from other organizations.

Back to the Resources and Links Table of Contents
 

Community Tool Box Resources
CTB offers many resources on working with diverse populations, including how to build a Multicultural Collaboration and Promoting Participation Among Diverse Groups.

The Praxis Project
The Praxis Project Web site offers tools on building diverse community-based initiatives. Also check out the Project’s July training on Building Strong Networks and Coalitions which will cover how to develop strong outreach, recruitment, and retention strategies for building a diverse, engaged base as well as effective strategies for building strong alliances.

Putting Real Youth Participation in Place
From the Administration for Children and Families, this resource outlines how to plan and prepare for youth involvement. Tips sheets and a case study are included.

Working with Diverse Communities: Fact Sheet
This fact sheet offers guidance on forming a coalition of diverse communities that values and makes the most of diversity.

Back to the Resources and Links Table of Contents
 

Evaluating Community-Based Partnerships: Why? When? Who? What? How?
This issue brief explores questions on how to conduct evaluations of community partnerships.

Evaluating Community Collaborations: A Research Synthesis
This research synthesis draws on the evaluation literature to identify the major challenges of evaluating collaborations, discuss approaches for addressing them, and suggest implications for the planned evaluation. It also includes descriptions of evaluation frameworks.

Evaluating Collaborations: Challenges and Methods
Prepared by the Extension Education Evaluation Topical Interest Group of the American Evaluation Association, this paper explores evaluation in the context of collaborative programming. The authors drew on existing evaluation frameworks and reoriented them to fit the characteristics of collaboration. It includes questions to ask in planning an evaluation.

Monitoring and Evaluation of Coalitions: Lessons from Eight Communities
This paper outlines lessons learned from Community Partners’ monitoring and evaluating of eight coalitions. A discussion of the evaluation methodology is included.

Back to the Resources and Links Table of Contents
 

Assessing Your Collaboration: A Self Evaluation Tool
This self-assessment exercise includes questions for groups to rate their collaboration on key factors such as goals, communication, sustainability, evaluation, connectedness, leadership, and community development.

Community Tool Box: Our Evaluation Model: Evaluating Comprehensive Community Initiatives
The CTB evaluation framework covers logic models, supporting collaborative planning, documenting change and distal outcomes, and recommendations for supporting collaborative planning. It includes checklists for action.

Evaluating the Collaborative Process: Fact Sheet
This fact sheet outlines questions to ask in planning an evaluation of a collaborative.

Evaluating Collaboratives: Reaching the Potential
This manual provides readers with a compendium of ideas and research to use when evaluating collaboratives and collaborative programs. The publication addresses how to evaluate self-interest, feasibility, process, outcomes, and techniques to use in evaluating collaboratives.

Partnership Assessment Tool
This free, web-based questionnaire developed by the Center for the Advancement of Collaborative Strategies in Health offers partnerships with a method to assess how well their collaborative process is working. Each member of the partnerships completes the online questionnaire separately. After 65% of the members have completed the questionnaire, the online system compiles and analyzes data from all the members’ responses and generates a report that identifies specific areas the partners can focus on to make the process work better.

The Wilder Collaboration Factors Inventory: Assessing Your Collaboration's Strengths and Weaknesses
This inventory is a practical tool for assessing how a collaboration is doing on the twenty factors that the Wilder Foundation’s research has shown to influence success. Summary scores for each of these factors are generated upon completion of the inventory. Collaborations can buy print copies of the inventory or complete the questionnaire online free of charge. Summary scores are generated online based on each member’s data, not the partnership as a whole. A partnership can compile the scores of all its members manually offline.

Back to the Resources and Links Table of Contents
 

Tobacco control advocates have been using collaboration to achieve common goals. Below are a few “real-time” examples from the current and past issues of Exchange and extra!

Asian American Youth Against Tobacco (AAYAT)
AAYAT is a coalition of Asian American youth dedicated to activism and advocacy against tobacco use.

Asian Pacific Partners for Empowerment and Leadership (APPEAL)
APPEAL is a national network of over 400 members of consisting of community-based organizations, community leaders, community health centers, researchers, and state and local health departments working towards a tobacco-free Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) community.

California Tobacco Control Alliance
The Alliance is a statewide organization working to reduce the use of tobacco in California through collaboration with government, nonprofit, health, corporate, academic and business organizations.

Clean Air Works
Nineteen adjoining Massachusetts communities around Cambridge and Boston created Clean Air Works to work together to “protect all workers from exposure to environmental tobacco smoke through educating communities about the danger of secondhand smoke and securing smokefree workplaces.” Read about the coalition’s achievement in the February 2004 Extra!

Indiana Latino Institute
The Indiana Latino Institute grew out of a statewide Latino Forum on Tobacco Control of health professionals, school administrators, and community organizations. The Institute focuses on improving health for the Hispanic/Latino community, especially as it relates to alcohol and tobacco.

Massachusetts QuitWorks
QuitWorks is a collaboration among eight health plans in Massachusetts that provides health care providers with an approach to treating their patients who smoke by linking them to the state’s full range of effective tobacco treatment resources.

National Network on Tobacco Prevention and Poverty (NNTPP)
The goal of the NNTPP is to engage key organizations serving low SES populations in tobacco control efforts and to assist them with resource development and assessments, technical assistance, capacity building, and evaluation to prevent and reduce tobacco use in low-income communities.

Pacific Center on Tobacco and Health
The Pacific Center is a five-state coalition of lead agencies and state health departments working to implement comprehensive tobacco cessation programs in their own states, and collaborating to provide the support and technical assistance needed for other states to design and implement effective programs. This collaboration has created many documents including Linking a Network: Integrate Quitlines with Health Systems which provides guidance on quitlines partnering with health systems.

Partnership for a Healthy Mississippi
The Partnership for a Healthy Mississippi takes a comprehensive approach to reduce tobacco use by drawing upon an alliance of hundreds of statewide private and public organizations, as well as youth, medical, charitable, faith-based and civic groups. Read tips from the Partnership on its success in the February 2004 Exchange.

Prevention Alliance for Tobacco Control and Health (PATCH)
PATCH is a community coalition dedicated to tobacco use prevention in DeKalb County, Georgia. PATCH members are parents, teachers, youth, schools, grassroots organizations, local government agencies, advocacy groups, health care providers, concerned residents and others. Read about PATCH’s policy success in the February 2004 Exchange.

Smokefree Air is a Union Issue
This new resource from ANR Foundation highlights the natural alliance between workers' unions and smokefree advocates. It includes examples of collaborating activities, such as the Organized Labor and Tobacco Control Network.

South Dakota Tobacco Free Kids Network
A statewide alliance of health, medical, education, parent, youth, law enforcement and other civic organizations advocating for laws, policies and funding of effective programs that will result in significant reductions in tobacco use and addiction, especially among children and high-risk groups.

United Communities Against Tobacco Abuse (UCATA)
Funded by the California Department of Health Services, Tobacco Control Section, UCATA is comprised of the statewide ethnic networks and the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender community. Read how this group collaborates to educate policymakers in TTAC Get the Facts.

Back to the Resources and Links Table of Contents
 
Back to Table of Contents
 

• Collaboration Terminology
• Power of Proof

Back to Table of Contents

Cigarettes: What the Warning Label Doesn't Tell You—Information Tobacco Companies Don't Want Teens To Know About The Dangers of Smoking
American Council on Science and Health has produced this book specifically for teens on the dangers of smoking

Statewide Smokefree Law Readiness Assessment Guide
Americans for Nonsmokers’ Rights recently released the Statewide Smokefree Law Readiness Assessment Guide, which helps advocates think through the various capacity and preparedness issues involved with pursuing statewide legislation.
Go to: http://www.no-smoke.org/StateLawReadinessAssessment.pdf

A New JAMA/CDC Study Finds Tobacco Use Remains No. 1 Cause of Preventable Death
CDC fact sheet: http://www.cdc.gov/nccdphp/factsheets/death_causes2000.htm
JAMA Article: http://jama.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/abstract/291/10/1238

New Tobacco Control Supplement: The Airline Flight Attendants’ fight to end smoking aloft
Available at: http://tc.bmjjournals.com/content/vol13/suppl_1/

Helping Young Smokers Quit Initiative – Call for applications
The Helping Young Smokers Quit (HYSQ) study will be looking at a wide mix of practices now being used by youth cessation programs across the United States. The information collected will be used to fill a gap in knowledge about the types of programs that are currently being offered, to identify those that are more effective, and to highlight promising directions for future research and programming. The results will help states, communities, schools, and other community-based and youth-serving organizations adopt and implement programs that work. HYSQ needs applications from programs interested in being part of this nationwide effort. Participating programs will receive reports of the study findings, guidance and tools for future self-assessment, and monetary payments over the course of the yearlong evaluation. To take part in this exciting opportunity, programs must apply on-line at the HYSQ site by May 15, 2004.

For a complete description of the evaluation, please visit the HYSQ web site at www.helpingyoungsmokersquit.org. HYSQ is a national program administered by the University of Illinois at Chicago, and supported by The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the National Cancer Institution.

Back to Table of Contents

The University of California, San Francisco Center for Tobacco Control Research and Education announces a one-day workshop for community-based advocates on using tobacco industry documents for advocacy—June 19, 2004
This workshop will cover: introduction to tobacco industry documents; hands-on practice searching tobacco industry documents databases under the supervision of expert documents researchers; examples of ways in which the documents can be of use for public health work in your community; and opportunities to meet and brainstorm with top documents researchers and other advocates. For information about registering for the workshop, please contact: Dr. Valerie Yerger at valyer@itsa.ucsf.edu or (415) 476-2784.

The 3rd National Tobacco Symposium on Young Adults Long Beach, California April 21-22, 2004
The 3rd National Tobacco Symposium on Young Adults is an invitation to a broad spectrum of student affairs professionals, researchers, health educators, students and community members to join together to learn more about one of the greatest health problems facing young adults today. Although, we have seen and read about the impact tobacco has on society, surprisingly, there is only limited current information about the use of tobacco by 18-24 year olds or about effective prevention and cessation strategies to reach this population. While many campuses and communities are interested in increasing their efforts in tobacco control, few opportunities exist for a forum that specifically targets this age group.
For more information: http://www.tobaccofreeu.org/student_involvement/symp2004.asp

Association of State and Territorial Chronic Disease Directors -Findings on program integration within state health agencies
The Association of State and Territorial Chronic Disease Directors (CDD), with funding from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, conducted a study to determine state health agencies' efforts to integrate tobacco use prevention and chronic disease and health promotion programs. The study identifies integration barriers and enabling linkage points across public health programs; case studies of program integration; and makes recommendations for initiating and strengthening program integration. Findings from this research will be reported to state tobacco control, chronic disease and health promotion program managers in Spring 2004.

Back to Table of Contents

Alan “Chip” Chambers
Rubber Buyer’s Alliance Incorporated
Chip.riba@comcast.net

Germaine Dennaker
Rhode Island Tobacco Control Program
401-421-6487
gdennaker@lungri.org

Shirley Duma
California Healthy Cities and Communities
Sduma@civicpartnerships.org

Donald Hitchcock
National Coalition for LGBT Health
202-797-3516
coalition@lgbthealth.net

Patricia Renee Massie
Lincoln-Lancaster County Health Department
RMassie@ci.lincoln.ne.us

Aida McCammon
Indiana Latino Institute
amccammon@indianalatino.com

Jennifer Stalley
South Dakota Tobacco Free Kids Network
jennifer.stalley@cancer.org

Kristen Tertzakian
Association of State and Territorial Health Directors
Tobacco Prevention & Control Policy
ktertzakian@astho.org

Traci Verardo
California Tobacco Control Alliance
traci.verardo@tobaccofreealliance.org

Back to Table of Contents

Aliki P. Weakland, MPH, MSW
   Editor

Alison Sipler, MPH, CHES
   Managing Editor

Samantha Helfert, MLS
   Information Specialist

Lisbeth Klau, MPH
   Writer/Researcher

JoAnn Weiss, MA, MPH
   Writer/Researcher

Back to Table of Contents

Notice: All email sent to or from the exchange extra! e-mail system may be retained, monitored, and/or reviewed by ttac personnel.