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Healthy Generations eNewsletter

January 2025

Healthy GenerationseNewsletterJanuary 2025

Happy New Year!

This eNewsletter is brought to you by the

Center for Leadership Education in Maternal and Child Public Health.

Student Spotlight: How did Katya Ivanchuk Identify Culturally Sensitive, Family-Centered Supports in St. Paul?

#UMNMCH student Katya Ivanchuk (she/her, MCH 2025) reflects on her deployment with Leap Pediatric and Adolescent Care in St. Paul, where she worked on a community needs assessment, literature review, and resource outreach campaign. Her work focused on enhancing the health and wellness of families by researching local organizations and promoting culturally sensitive, family-centered support. Katya writes, “By collaborating with translators, local organizations, and families, I prioritized culturally sensitive and equitable approaches to supporting family well-being.” Read more about her experience here!

MCH Leads Blog: Advancing Health Equity and Mentorship in MCH

Diana Calderon, MPH student in the Community Health Sciences Training Program at the University of California Los Angeles, is the January feature of the Health Equity Edition of MCH Leads. In her blog entry, titled “Advancing Health Equity and Mentorship in MCH,” Diana applies MCH Competency 7 (Cultural Competency) and Competency 9 (Teaching, Coaching, and Mentoring) to her work with the National MCH Workforce Development Center, in partnership with the University of Illinois Division of Specialized Care for Children (UIC DSCC). “While collaborating with my co-intern, I assessed Illinois’ capacity to improve access to medical homes for children and youth with special healthcare needs (CYSHCN). Our work produced several findings and recommendations that will guide the state’s next steps.” Learn more about Diana’s contributions here!

Save the Date For Spring 2025 Center Events

Bright Spots Mini-Lab: Learning Lab–How to Turn Qualitative Insights Into Compelling Multimedia Presentations

January 30, 2025 | 11:30 AM - 1:00 PM CT | Virtual

In this Learning Lab session led by Rich Thau, participants will learn how to quickly produce accurate multimedia presentations of qualitative research results following the completion of online focus groups and other qualitative methods. In preparation for the session, feel free to browse through Engagious’ previous videos. Learn more and register here.

Women’s Health Research Symposium: Maternal Health Disparities
February 13, 2025 | 12:30 PM - 4:45 PM CT | McNamara Alumni Center (East Bank Campus) or Virtual

The UMN Women's Health Research Conference features plenary panel presentations, panel discussions, and a poster session on women’s health research. It draws interdisciplinary women’s health researchers, healthcare providers, students, and community public health professionals for a day of learning, networking, and research dissemination. This event is hosted by the Center for Women’s Health Research and the Building Interdisciplinary Research Careers in Women's Health (BIRCWH) program, and is co-sponsored by the Center. Register here and submit your abstract by January 20, 2025.


Health Disparities Roundtable
April 4, 2025 | 9:00 AM - 11:30 AM CT | Coffman Memorial Union or Virtual

The Health Disparities Roundtable is an annual event focused on exploring key issues in health and racial equity research, policy, and practice. It features speakers from both local and national levels who share strategies for prevention and solutions to improve health outcomes. This event is hosted by the Health Equity Work Group (HEWG) and is co-sponsored by the Center. Register here.

Research

At Long Last, the Surge in STIs May Be Leveling Off

This New York Times article found that rates of gonorrhea declined in 2023, while diagnoses of syphilis and chlamydia held roughly steady, according to new C.D.C. data. More than 2.4 million new STIs were diagnosed last year, about a million more than that figure stood 20 years ago. However, experts are cautiously optimistic that STI rates will continue to follow this overall rate of decline.

Supporting Native Hawaiian Youth Mental Health Through Indigenous Culturally-Driven and Land-Based Healing Approaches

Kānaka Maoli (Native Hawaiians) are the Indigenous People of the Hawaiian Islands. Their connections to the 'āina (land) and moana (ocean) are deeply spiritual and are considered ancestors and are the foundation of Native Hawaiian identity and well-being. This brief from Child Trends provides historical background on Native Hawaiian cultural Traditions and on geopolitical shifts that have impacted their connections to the land.

Research Implications of OMB’s Revised Race and Ethnicity Standards for the Latino Population

Collecting accurate data on race and ethnicity is critically important. It allows researchers and policymakers to capture changes and document the health and well-being of a range of racial and ethnic populations to assess where resources and support are needed. After the federal Office of Management and Budget (OMB) updated their research standards in March 2024 for the first time since 1997, the National Research Center on Hispanic Children and Families have highlighted some of these key changes that are most relevant to the Latino population here.

Events

2025 Society for Adolescent Health and Medicine (SAHM) Annual Meeting: Empowering You and YOU-th to Make Our Voices Heard

March 4-7, 2025 | Baltimore, MD

The SAHM Annual Meeting focuses on advocacy, research, policy, interventions, and clinical care. Registration types vary depending on career level but registration prices will remain the same for students and international attendees after early bird registration closes on February 4, 2025.

The International Meeting on Indigenous Child Health

March 28-30, 2025 | Winnipeg, Manitoba
From mental health to infectious diseases, early childhood to adolescence, the 11th Annual International Meeting on Indigenous Child Health is a forum for exploring a range of health-promoting programs and strategies. Early bird registration rates are available through February 26. This event is jointly sponsored by the American Academy of Pediatrics Committee on Native American Child Health (CONACH) and the Canadian Paediatric Society.

Resources

Toolkit: Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging (DEIB)

Family Voices, a national organization that uplifts families and friends of CYSHCN and disabilities, created a DEIB framework to address the realities of the mission and work in the field. Learn more about implicit biases, intersectionality, and more in their toolkit here.

Handouts: Playful Activities for Infants, Toddlers, and Children

Harvard University’s Center on the Developing Child collaborated with the LEGO Foundation to develop resources for playful, age-appropriate activities for children, from newborns to adolescents. These activities are designed to be easy to do at home or on-the-go, and handouts are available in English and in Spanish.

Guide: Cross-Sector Partnerships to Improve Public Health

The Public Health Communications Collaborative developed these communications guides to spread knowledge on the best communications practices for developing cross-sector partnerships in your community that build trust, increase audience reach, and lead to more public health funding.

Consensus Study: Enacting an Ethic of Care and Responsibility in Global Health Partnerships

Done by the Uganda National Academy of Sciences, this study discusses the history of global health partnerships, systemic inequities, and specific thematic conclusions and recommendations. “Success starts with a willingness to learn from and collaborate with others.” - Shailey Prasad, MD, MPH, executive director of the UMN Center for Global Health and Social Responsibility.

You received this message because you have subscribed to the Healthy Generations listserv. This newsletter is produced monthly by the Center for Leadership Education in Maternal and Child Public Health at the University of Minnesota. Email mch@umn.edu to have your event, resource, or publication included in our eNewsletter.


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The Center for Leadership Education
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The Center is supported by HHS HRSA (grant # T76MC00005). https://mch.umn.edu