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U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Office of Disease Prevention and Health Promotion

Increase the proportion of local public health agencies that use core competencies in continuing education — PHI‑07 Data Methodology and Measurement

On this page:  About the National Data  |  Methodology  |  History

About the National Data

Data

Data Source:  National Profile of Local Health Departments (NACCHO Profile), National Association of County and City Health Officials (NACCHO)

Baseline: 28.5 percent of local public health agencies incorporated Core Competencies for Public Health Professionals into developing training plans by 2016

Target: 33.1 percent

Numerator
Number of local public health agencies incorporating Core Competencies for Public Health Professionals into developing training plans.
Denominator
Number of local public health agencies responding to this item in the NACCHO Profile Survey.
Target-setting method
Percentage point improvement
Target-setting method details
Percentage point improvement from the baseline using Cohen's h effect size of 0.10.
1
Target-setting method justification
Trend data were not available for this objective. A percentage point improvement was calculated using Cohen's h effect size of 0.1. This method was used because the Healthy People 2030 Workgroup Subject Matter Experts viewed this as an ambitious yet achievable target based on levels of activity in local jurisdictions and the fact that those jurisdictions that are not yet using the Core Competencies will likely have the most challenges in such workforce development efforts.

Methodology

Questions used to obtain the national baseline data

(For additional information, please visit the data source page linked above.)

From the 2016 National Profile of Local Health Departments (LHD):

Numerator:
Does your LHD use core competencies for public health workers developed by the Council on Linkages (http://www.phf.org/link/corecompetencies.htm) in any of the following ways? (Select all that apply)
  1. Writing position descriptions
  2. Conducting staff performance evaluations
  3. Assessing staff training needs
  4. Developing staff training plans
  5. Other use (Please specify)
  6. Have not used

Methodology notes

The Core Competencies for Public Health Professionals (Core Competencies) are a consensus set of skills for the broad practice of public health, as defined by the 10 Essential Public Health Services. Developed by the Council on Linkages Between Academia and Public Health Practice (Council on Linkages), the Core Competencies reflect foundational skills desirable for professionals engaging in the practice, education, and research of public health. These competencies are organized into eight domains, reflecting skill areas within public health, and three tiers, representing career stages for public health professionals.

History

Comparable HP2020 objective
Retained, which includes core objectives that are continuing from Healthy People 2020 with no change in measurement.

1. Effect size h=0.1 was chosen to correspond with 10% improvement from a baseline of 50%.